Thanks to the magical carnival of capitalism that is Ebay, I've managed to acquire some horsehair. And that means it's time for another beehive helmet, with a plume on top.
This time I'm reconstructing a helmet shown on a ring from Shaft Grave IV at Mycenae. It's a very similar style to the Phaistos helmet, but with extra padding around the lower edge.
Notice how these helmets have what look like horizontal ridges around the bottom. This is not unusual with the earlier beehive helmets and likely represents strips of leather that have been padded with either linen or wool, to provide extra protection. The padded leather has been further reinforced with circular metal attachments. Because of the way beehive helmets are constructed they're naturally thinner at the bottom, so it makes sense to put a bit of extra protection in this area.
The following doodle illustrates what I think we're looking at here:
Blue lines represent the inner core of the helmet, and black lines represent the outer shell. You can see where there's space for extra padding between the core and the shell.
The archaeological record tells us a lot about what a Mycenaean's helmet had to protect him from, and why a good thick helmet was desirable.
Head injuries, particularly blunt force ones, seem to have been common on Mycenaean battlefields. We don't have a lot of skulls from Bronze Age Greece, but a number of the ones we do have show evidence of combat injuries and some had undergone trepanation surgery. This would have been done to treat intracranial pressure caused by a blow to the skull, or to remove splinters of bone from a head injury.
The reason these people sustained blunt force head injuries is that they were, quite literally, hitting each other over the head with hammers. This is a stone hammer from 1525-1450 BCE. It is about 10cm long and would have been fixed to a wooden handle.
Other weapons likely to cause head injuries were maces, axes, and slingshots. Early Mycenaean swords were designed for thrusting or stabbing and would not usually have been a source of head injuries, but as we've seen there were many ways to sustain head injuries on a Mycenaean battlefield.
My friend informs me that the ancient Hungarians also practiced trepanation. They covered the hole in the skull with a metal plate to protect the brain, and had a surprisingly low incidence of infections. And did you know that the Hungarian word for a smart person literally means "brain drilled"?
Sources discussing skulls and skull injuries
Alusik, T. 2015. Skull Trepanations in Bronze Age Greece: An Archaeologist’s View. World Neurosurgery, 84, 2:214-217.
Arnott, 1997. Surgical Practice in the prehistoric Aegean, Medizinhistorisches Journal. Band 32, Heft 3-4.
Castleden, R. 2005. Mycenaeans. Routledge: Oxon.
Papagrigorakis, M. J. et al, 2014. Neurosurgery During the Bronze Age: A Skull Trepanation in 1900 BC Greece. World Neurosurgery, 81, 2:431-435.
This time I'm reconstructing a helmet shown on a ring from Shaft Grave IV at Mycenae. It's a very similar style to the Phaistos helmet, but with extra padding around the lower edge.
Notice how these helmets have what look like horizontal ridges around the bottom. This is not unusual with the earlier beehive helmets and likely represents strips of leather that have been padded with either linen or wool, to provide extra protection. The padded leather has been further reinforced with circular metal attachments. Because of the way beehive helmets are constructed they're naturally thinner at the bottom, so it makes sense to put a bit of extra protection in this area.
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| Image from Bensozia |
The following doodle illustrates what I think we're looking at here:
Blue lines represent the inner core of the helmet, and black lines represent the outer shell. You can see where there's space for extra padding between the core and the shell.
The archaeological record tells us a lot about what a Mycenaean's helmet had to protect him from, and why a good thick helmet was desirable.
Head injuries, particularly blunt force ones, seem to have been common on Mycenaean battlefields. We don't have a lot of skulls from Bronze Age Greece, but a number of the ones we do have show evidence of combat injuries and some had undergone trepanation surgery. This would have been done to treat intracranial pressure caused by a blow to the skull, or to remove splinters of bone from a head injury.
The reason these people sustained blunt force head injuries is that they were, quite literally, hitting each other over the head with hammers. This is a stone hammer from 1525-1450 BCE. It is about 10cm long and would have been fixed to a wooden handle.
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| Hammer-head from Zakros. |
Other weapons likely to cause head injuries were maces, axes, and slingshots. Early Mycenaean swords were designed for thrusting or stabbing and would not usually have been a source of head injuries, but as we've seen there were many ways to sustain head injuries on a Mycenaean battlefield.
My friend informs me that the ancient Hungarians also practiced trepanation. They covered the hole in the skull with a metal plate to protect the brain, and had a surprisingly low incidence of infections. And did you know that the Hungarian word for a smart person literally means "brain drilled"?
Sources discussing skulls and skull injuries
Alusik, T. 2015. Skull Trepanations in Bronze Age Greece: An Archaeologist’s View. World Neurosurgery, 84, 2:214-217.
Arnott, 1997. Surgical Practice in the prehistoric Aegean, Medizinhistorisches Journal. Band 32, Heft 3-4.
Castleden, R. 2005. Mycenaeans. Routledge: Oxon.
Papagrigorakis, M. J. et al, 2014. Neurosurgery During the Bronze Age: A Skull Trepanation in 1900 BC Greece. World Neurosurgery, 81, 2:431-435.
Neat! I look forward to your next creation. Perhaps sometime you'll model it (along with your linothorax)?
ReplyDeleteI think it would go with the linothorax too, there were apparently some fragments of laminated linen armour found at Mycenae.
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