The Ermine Street Guard is a British classical reenactment and living history society, founded in 1972 by Chris Haines MBE. [1] Its main objective is to study and display weapons, tactics and equipment of the Roman army of the first Century AD. [2] [3] [4] It was named after Ermine Street, [5] a major Roman road from London to Lincoln and York.
In 1972, a reenactment group was formed under the name Ermine Street Ghosts, to help fund the restoration of the Witcombe and Bentham village hall. [5] Initially, clothing and armour was manufactured for an eight men contubernium and the troop marched and performed for a crowd of 2500. [6] After the fundraiser requests came in for attendances at other events. A society was formed, more people joined and additional equipment was manufactured. Presently the society numbers some 50-60 members, [5] from all over England and Wales. [6] Nearly all of those are men, because no women are allowed to perform male roles for reasons of historical accuracy. [6] In 2012 the society raised some £25,000 for the refurbishing of the village hall it was founded because of. [5]
From the onset it was decided that clothes, weapons and equipment would have to look as historically accurate as possible, though at first the materials used were hardly that. [6] Over the years the Guardsmen became more passionate about authenticity and nowadays the Ermine Street Guard is known for a certain perfectionism in this. [7] [8] Weapons and equipment are nearly all made by hand, using much the same tools and methods the Romans did, when possible. [8] [9] Over the years the society has remade much of its armour and equipment because research had proven the old ones not quite authentic. [8] Consequently the society is frequently asked to pose for, or take part in more serious activities, like research and publications. [10]
The Ermine Street Guard gives performances at archaeological or historical sites and events, in museums and in schools. [3] Guardsmen are occasionally asked to perform in films or other media. [7] The society takes part in practical research of Roman methods of manufacturing and operating artillery and other equipment. Scientific understanding of the Roman soldier's body armour, the lorica segmentata was helped by the activities of the Guard. [11]
The Ermine Street Guard also owns tents, cooking utensils, a ballista, a heavy crane and an onager, all as historically accurate as possible. [12]
Chain mail is the name of a type of armour consisting of small metal rings linked together in a pattern to form a mesh. It was in common military use between the 3rd century BC and the 16th century AD in Europe, while continued to be used in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East as late as the 17th century. A coat of this armour is often called a hauberk or sometimes a byrnie.
Infantry is a specialization of military personnel who engage in ground combat on foot. Infantry generally consists of light infantry, irregular infantry, heavy infantry, mountain infantry, motorized infantry, mechanized infantry, airborne infantry, air assault infantry, and naval infantry. Other types of infantry, such as line infantry and mounted infantry, were once commonplace but fell out of favor in the 1800s with the invention of more accurate and powerful weapons.
The ballista, plural ballistae, sometimes called bolt thrower, was an ancient missile weapon that launched either bolts or stones at a distant target.
Gladius is a Latin word properly referring to the type of sword that was used by ancient Roman foot soldiers starting from the 3rd century BC and until the 3rd century AD. Linguistically, within Latin, the word also came to mean "sword", regardless of the type used.
Historical reenactments is an educational or entertainment activity in which mainly amateur hobbyists and history enthusiasts dress in historic uniforms or costumes and follow a plan to recreate aspects of a historical event or period. This may be as narrow as a specific moment from a battle, such as the reenactment of Pickett's Charge presented during the 1913 Gettysburg reunion, or as broad as an entire period, such as Regency reenactment.
The pilum was a javelin commonly used by the Roman army in ancient times. It was generally about 2 m long overall, consisting of an iron shank about 7 mm (0.28 in) in diameter and 600 mm (24 in) long with a pyramidal head, attached to a wooden shaft by either a socket or a flat tang.
A cuirass is a piece of armour that covers the torso, formed of one or more pieces of metal or other rigid material. The word probably originates from the original material, leather, from the French cuirace and Latin word coriacea. The use of the term "cuirass" generally refers to both the breastplate and the backplate pieces; whereas a breastplate only protects the front, a cuirass protects both the front and the back of the wearer.
Knowledge about military technology of the Viking Age is based on relatively sparse archaeological finds, pictorial representations, and to some extent on the accounts in the Norse sagas and laws recorded in the 12th–14th century.
Via Devana is the name given to a Roman Road in England that ran from Colchester in the south-east, through Cambridge in the interior, and on to Chester in the north-west. These were important Roman military centres and it is conjectured that the main reason the road was constructed was military rather than civilian. The Latin name for Chester is Deva and 'Via Devana' is thus 'The Chester Road'. Colchester was Colonia Victricensis, 'the City of Victory', and lays claim to be the oldest Roman city in Britain. The Via Devana had little civilian rationale and the road eventually fell into disuse as it was not possible to maintain extensive public works following withdrawal of the last Roman legion from Britain in 407. As a result, its route is difficult to find today, especially in its more northern reaches. It is omitted from some historians' maps for this reason but most nowadays accept its existence. The undocumented name Via Devana was coined by Charles Mason, D.D., of Trinity College, Cambridge, who was also rector of Orwell, Cambridgeshire, and Woodwardian Professor of Fossils at Cambridge University from 1734. During his life, Mason compiled a complete map of Cambridgeshire which was later published in 1808, long after his death.
Historically, an armourer is a person who makes personal armour, especially plate armour.
Medieval reenactment is a form of historical reenactment that focuses on re-enacting European history in the period from the fall of Rome to about the end of the 15th century. The second half of this period is often called the Middle Ages. This multiplicity of terms is compounded by the variety of other terms used for the period.
Combat reenactment is a side of historical reenactment which aims to depict historical forms of combat. This may refer to either single combat, melees involving small groups, or nearly full-scale battles with hundreds of participants.
In historical reenactment, authenticity is a measure of how close an item, prop, action, weapon, tactic, or custom is to what would actually have been used or done in the time period being depicted. For example, in most northern European medieval reenactment cotton is an inauthentic material—as opposed to wool or linen—though it would be authentic in more modern periods and events, such as American Civil War reenactment or World War II reenactment. Likewise, pop culture references and talking about modern events or objects is inauthentic.
Roman military personal equipment was produced in large numbers to established patterns, and used in an established manner. These standard patterns and uses were called the res militaris or disciplina. Its regular practice during the Roman Republic and Roman Empire led to military excellence and victory. The equipment gave the Romans a very distinct advantage over their barbarian enemies, especially so in the case of armour. This does not mean that every Roman soldier had better equipment than the richer men among his opponents. Roman equipment was not of a better quality than that used by the majority of Rome's adversaries. Other historians and writers have stated that the Roman army's need for large quantities of "mass produced" equipment after the so-called "Marian Reforms" and subsequent civil wars led to a decline in the quality of Roman equipment compared to the earlier Republican era:
The production of these kinds of helmets of Italic tradition decreased in quality because of the demands of equipping huge armies, especially during civil wars...The bad quality of these helmets is recorded by the sources describing how sometimes they were covered by wicker protections, like those of Pompeius' soldiers during the siege of Dyrrachium in 48 BC, which were seriously damaged by the missiles of Caesar's slingers and archers.
It would appear that armour quality suffered at times when mass production methods were being used to meet the increased demand which was very high the reduced size cuirasses would also have been quicker and cheaper to produce, which may have been a deciding factor at times of financial crisis, or where large bodies of men were required to be mobilized at short notice, possibly reflected in the poor-quality, mass produced iron helmets of Imperial Italic type C, as found, for example, in the River Po at Cremona, associated with the Civil Wars of AD 69 AD; Russell Robinson, 1975, 67
Up until then, the quality of helmets had been fairly consistent and the bowls well decorated and finished. However, after the Marian Reforms, with their resultant influx of the poorest citizens into the army, there must inevitably have been a massive demand for cheaper equipment, a situation which can only have been exacerbated by the Civil Wars...
The scorpio or scorpion was a type of Roman torsion siege engine and field artillery piece. It was described in detail by the early-imperial Roman architect and engineer Vitruvius in the 1st century BC and by the 4th century AD officer and historian Ammianus Marcellinus.
Middelaldercentret is an experimental living history archaeological open-air museum in Denmark, which depicts the middle ages in the Denmark of the late 14th and early 15th centuries. It is located in Sundby Lolland, some 4 km northwest of the centre of Nykøbing Falster on the waterfront of Guldborgsund.
A torsion siege engine is a type of siege engine that utilizes torsion to launch projectiles. They were initially developed by the ancient Macedonians, specifically Philip II of Macedon and Alexander the Great, and used through the Middle Ages until the development of gunpowder artillery in the 14th century rendered them mostly obsolete.
John Waller was an English pioneer of the historical European martial arts (HEMA) revival, a fight director for stage, screen and spectacle, and a teacher of martial arts.
The torsion mangonel myth, or simply the myth of the mangonel, is the belief that mangonels were torsion siege engines such as the ballista or onager which used the tension effect of twisted cords to shoot projectiles. Despite a significant body of research dating as far back as the 19th century pointing to the contrary, "it has not stopped the transmission of the myth to the present day." Evidence for the usage of torsion siege weapons, with the exception of the springald, exist only up until the 6th century, when they were superseded by the traction trebuchet, more commonly known as the mangonel.
Christoper Haines is an historical reenactor and the founder of the Ermine Street Guard in 1972.
