The military use of manicae

[CiceroD]

Anyone familiar with Gladiator dipictions has likely seen the manica. it was a laminated arm guard for the right arm (holding the sword of course).

 

Reading Adrian Goldsworthy's Roman Warfare there is a depiction of Trajan's troops on pg 135 (From the metopes of Troepaeum Trajani commemorating the Dacian campaign) This depicts the Roman legionary bashing an opponent's face in with his scutum. The legionary is clearly wearing a lorica hamata and a manica.

 

Ive never heard any reference to this form of armor being used ouside the arena (then again I have almost no primary source material ).

how long was it used?

and where or what circumstances?

 

Also wasn't Trajan's Dacian campaign in the time of the lorica segmentata? (Im thinking Trajan's column here)

[Melvadius]

Anyone familiar with Gladiator dipictions has likely seen the manica. it was a laminated arm guard for the right arm (holding the sword of course).

 

Reading Adrian Goldsworthy's Roman Warfare there is a depiction of Trajan's troops on pg 135 (From the metopes of Troepaeum Trajani commemorating the Dacian campaign) This depicts the Roman legionary bashing an opponent's face in with his scutum. The legionary is clearly wearing a lorica hamata and a manica.

 

Ive never heard any reference to this form of armor being used ouside the arena (then again I have almost no primary source material ).

how long was it used?

and where or what circumstances?

 

Also wasn't Trajan's Dacian campaign in the time of the lorica segmentata? (Im thinking Trajan's column here)

 

 

I won't go into all the detail here but you will find quite an informative article about the manica and it's possible uses extending beyond the obvious Dacian campaign on the Roman Military Research Site at this link:

 

http://www.romanarmy.net/manica.htm

[Lost_Warrior]

Didn't a lot of gladiators get their training ideas from the Legions? Wouldn't it have stood to reason then, that they got some of the weapons and armor ideas from the Legions as well?

[Melvadius]

Didn't a lot of gladiators get their training ideas from the Legions? Wouldn't it have stood to reason then, that they got some of the weapons and armor ideas from the Legions as well?

 

While agreeing that gladiatorial equipment would be highly likely to have had some of its origin in some form of military/ war related equipment or activity that doesn't necessitate that any of it was used to any great extent by the Roman military.

 

As far as I know it is one of the area's where there is very limited if any real documentary evidence. Traditionally interpretations have been primarily based on sculptural and similarly visual evidence backed up by a limited amount of archaeological evidence which has previously seemed to be almost exclusively related to gladiatorial interpretations.

 

The archaeological find of apparent 'manica' from Carlisle, especially when linked to the earlier Newstead finds, has pushed the legion link beyond the previous sculpturally interpetated view of a purely Dacian related phenomena.

[CiceroD]

So manicae were used in Britain too,

 

Was this dated to around the same period "5 Good Emperors"?

[Melvadius]

So manicae were used in Britain too,

 

Was this dated to around the same period "5 Good Emperors"?

 

I haven't heard anything that revises the original estimate that the items of metal work found at Carlisle (including the possible "manica" are "thought to date from around the time of the Emperor Hadrian's visit to Britain in June 122".

 

On that basis they do come from the time of the "Five Good Emperors".

[caldrail]

The problem with sculptural depictions of this sort is that they're not photographs, they're artistic interpretations of what the sculptor imagines was the scene (though often he may have seen a few things first hand it must be said). Helmets for instance are very often shown as the greek 'attic' style, the same sort we see in film and tv, yet these were used for display purposes rather than combat, and we know roman troops used the more familiar bowl patterns. Its entirely possible that manicae were used by legionaries from time to time, since there was nothing to prevent a soldier paying for his own equipment (which he did anyway via stoppages in pay), and some may have seen the gladiators using these in the arena and thought it a good idea to get similar protection, or perhaps the gladiators were using idealised military hardware in their contests. As I've mentioned elsewhere, developments in miltary and gladiatorial combat went together and its not clear who took the lead. I do doubt though that manicae were in widespread use and its also possible the image on the sculpture is.. well... wrong...

[Kosmo]

Some say that Tropeum Traiani from Admaclisi was made by the legions themselves, so depictions are less artistic and more realistic.