Norman Helm

My quest to create a decent helmet has taken me many places. I have scoured Goodwill stores and scrap piles for raw material. I have read obscure books on the functionality and purpose of different types of medieval armor. I have delved into the minds and tutorials of an eccentric Ukrainian hobbyist. I have done all of this to create a helm.

In the heat and frost, I wrought it from mithril and steel, pounding away at the hardened metal until from the dust it emerged; a Norman helm.

But like all great adventures, the journey was long and trying. Often it did not go as was expected; sometimes I even thought of turning back, but I pushed forward. It began in a land of grass and trees, when I first happened upon the art of weaving maille. Though the links from which I wove my armor were soft and weak, it made me dream of what could be.

For years I labored. Not hard work, but tedious and taxing on one’s patience and concentration. Hours every day passed me by. But when I held aloft the creation that which I had wrought, my heart was filled with not but satisfaction.

Its polished silver rings glittered in the light, and its edging the golden light of brass shone defiantly. I thought that nothing I had made before could triumph over the beauty and majesty of my great work.

But as any true craftsman knows, it did not long last. My hauberk was finished yes, but by itself it was little more than a tediously crafted decoration. Articles and accessories followed suit. First came forth the soft gambeson, the protector from brutish blows. Then from oak and mesh came the shield, a defender from what a body dare not take itself. A brais and a tunic had existed long before, but for long I had felt the urge to create the most difficult piece of all; the mighty helm.

It began when I spotted a large and thick piece of metal at a store. Looking at it, I assessed that it would suit my purposes. I had not the tape to measure, but my eyes judged that it was of significant value and size.

This is where our story takes an unexpected turn. My eyes were set on the creation of a sallet, the most versatile of the helms. When I found it lacking in size, I then turned to the mighty bascinet, strong and fair. But alas again I was foiled. In the tradition of my hauberk and the constraint of my metal’s size, I began the construction of the ancient Norman helm.

I was foolish to have used the bowl, for it was wrought of mithril. Though it is strong and does not tarnish, it is taxing to work and takes long to finish. For many days my hammer fell and rang upon the silver steel, the hard metal morphing into use.

At last, upon the third day, they were suitably wrought. Their form dished strong and stout, their facing planished smooth and clean. Twas then and only then, that with that fire of the sky I joined them to become one again.

Yet my troubles far from over, as I gazed upon my creation, I began to feel what I would later find be true. This stout cone which I had made was inept in size. I scoured across all places I knew to look but alas no more mithril of suitable size was to be found. It pained me to join the fair mithril with lesser iron, but it had to be thus. So from a lesser iron I beat out a band and with the same power as before joined it to the helm.

Of my last piece of the fair silver steel, I cut and joined to it a crucifix as a protection for the face. The time had come at last when all the components of metal were to be joined through the pounding of rivets; it was time for the parts not of steel. To join it all together came a band of leather; its shape was such so that it could be riveted to the helm. Holes for the aventail were also made and the padded lining cap was shorn and joined.

Thus it was born, a Norman helm.

 

the plates before and after dishing

after planishing

half welded

entirely welded

after grinding

cresting a band

the band after welded

padding

leather band for aventail

as scrap piece for the nasal plate

aluminum rivets to attach

Adding a ridge with a blunted chisel

hammers I used, a blunted chisel, and a trailer hitch for a ball stake

completed

Making a Hauberk

The maille took hours of opening and closing rings. I started by making two large squares for the front and back. The made a neck hole of equal width and wove it together. I then split the front and back too allow for increased mobility and attached two cylinders for sleeves. The last step was to edge it in brass.

For the gambeson I began with a simple quilted material and made it into the shape of a jacket with the sleeves separate.

I then created eyelets so that the sleeves could be removed and reattached as pleased

For the buckles I cut strips of veg tan leather and riveted then to the gambeson adding a backing for strength.

For the majority of my life I have worked to combine my two favorite fields of science and history. Though these fields may seem completely separate, the concrete form of historic items, like artifacts and buildings, are filled with countless innovations and marvels of physics and engineering - some of which I have done my best to recreate myself. While working on these projects, I have also learned the how to perform research and the value of prime sources and verification. With Hollywood flooding the media with misinformation about history, prime sources are essential to a person of my interest. While these sources can supply me with much information, other sources such as experimental archaeology and modern science have filled in the blanks of much of what I need. Knowledge of engineering, architecture, and metallurgy have also allowed me to make improvements upon things and allowed me to understand aspects that I would not otherwise recognize.

When I first became interested in the two fields, I treated them as entirely separate entities. For a long time, I saw science and history as two of the most starkly different fields I knew. It wasn’t until my interest in recreating historical artifacts that I began to see just how much they were linked. As with all projects, I began with research that would grow to become quite extensive. Patience became my greatest ally for research, history became my map for development, and science became my toolkit with which to build. With the knowledge of these three seemingly unrelated things, I would do things I never thought I would and grow to extensively know about things which I previous did not know existed.  I would often surprise myself with the depth to which I would reach and the remarkable complexity of things I would have otherwise considered primitive and outdated.  Though years have passed and I still have infinitely more to learn, my experience has given me a respect for the past, an appreciation for the present, and a glimpse into the future.

Other maille projects

Gambeson and Mallie Hauberk

Making a Heater Shield

To begin my shield, I started with an oak board that I cut into slats and laid out so that the grain faced opposite directions.

To get the classic curved shape, I built a steam box to make the pieces pliable.

I had to make a jig and tried to line them up to do as many as I could in one heat.
 After that I lay all the boards out as they were supposed to be. Historically the boards would have been connected with a kind of glue. However, due to this shield being functional I used epoxy resin and added a layer of fiberglass mesh between the layers. After which I used two sheets of cloth on the face and back.

I cut leather handles and attached then using bolts. The rolled up piece is a strip of rawhide

To attach the rawhide to the shield, I drilled holes all along the edge and sewed it in using artificial sinew.