Once upon a time there probably were men who had neither armor nor arms.
They did not last long, for wild animals or other men with stones or
sticks in their hands killed them and ate them up. The first men about
whom we know anything definite already had weapons of stone. Arms and,
later, armor have accompanied man throughout his history.
The first obvious weapons were stones, roughly shaped to make them more
effective. Such are not to be found in the City Art Museum, but we do
have examples of the next type to develop, the weapons of the bronze
age.
Bronze is a mixture of copper and tin, and it was invented a very long
time ago, and in many different places. It was known in ancient Egypt,
in the Far East and in Europe. Two thousand years before Christ the
Chinese were making bronze arms and domestic and ceremonial objects of
all sorts, and were making them so beautiful that such objects are
considered proper exhibits for an art museum. We have a very fine
collection of ancient Chinese bronzes, exhibited in the Museum’s Chinese
galleries, and among them are numerous weapons. The earliest include
axes and dagger-axes (Fig. 1). These date from the Shang Dynasty, (ca.
1523-ca. 1028 B.C.) This too is the period of a bronze helmet (Fig. 2)
in the form of a hood with smooth sides which come down well over the
cheeks, while leaving the front of the face exposed. Helmets of almost
precisely this form, but made of steel, were worn in Italy in the
fifteenth century, more than two thousand years later! This helmet has a
small plume-holder at its very top, and is peculiar in having, as its
only decoration, a pair of eyes embossed in relief on the forehead.
[Illustration: _Fig. 1. A Chinese bronze axe more than 3000 years
old, with a crouching monster in relief._]
From the Ordos region of Siberia, where a primitive culture lasted for a
very long time, comes a particularly fine ceremonial dagger (Fig. 3) of
bronze with inlays of turquoise. From China again, dating throughout the
thousand years before Christ, come numerous bronze weapons now in the
Museum’s Study Collection, including swords, daggers, and, from about
the beginning of the Christian Era, most ingenious mechanisms for the
crossbow (Fig. 4) a weapon which was not known in Europe until many
centuries later.
An Etruscan grave has yielded the large bronze disk of Fig. 5. On
stylistic grounds it is believed that this originated not in Etruria,
but on the other, Eastern, shore of Italy in Picenum, in the second half
of the seventh century before Christ. It was probably the central
reinforcement of a large leather shield.
[Illustration: _Fig. 2. A bronze helmet as old as the axe in Fig. 1,
but in form closely resembling Italian steel helmets of the
fifteenth century._]
[Illustration: _Fig. 3. The thin flat-bladed ceremonial bronze
dagger of a shaman or sorcerer from the steppes of Siberia._]
But of all the specimens of antique armor and arms in this (and possibly
in any other) museum, none surpasses the helmet shown in our
frontispiece. This helmet, together with fragments of armor, a shield
rim and a spear point, all now in the Museum, was found in a tomb near
Metaponto, in Southern Italy, where once there was a Greek colony. It is
believed to date from about the middle of the sixth century B.C. The
helmet is of bronze, the upper part of the bowl formed as the neck and
head of a ram. This is surmounted by a great crest of silver, resting on
a support of ivory. The cheek pieces of the helmet have rams’ heads in
profile embossed in relief. The eyes, the horns of the main ram’s head,
the ivory crest holder and part of the silver crest are restorations,
but enough original fragments of the crest were found with the helmet to
indicate exactly how the crest was shaped. Moreover the existence of
such metallic crests is verified by a bronze statuette of similar origin
(Fig. 6).
[Illustration: _Fig. 4. A crossbow lock two thousand years old, with
a model to show how the parts interlock. An ingenious bit of early
mechanical engineering._]
At first glance, the helmet proclaims itself a great work of sculpture,
and proves that arms and armor can properly belong in a museum of art.
How very well this piece deserves its place here is still more apparent
on close examination. It seems incredible that so long ago a craftsman
could, without any of our modern tools, have formed from a single plate
of bronze such a deep and difficult forging as this helmet bowl. It is
equally amazing that, in a period still considered as archaic, his
artistic imagination could have produced so naturalistic yet so noble a
rendition of an animal form. The technical skill and taste of the
engraving and embossing are also noteworthy: the suggestion of locks of
hair around the forehead, the eyebrows which terminate as snakes’ heads,
the suggestions of skin texture on the rams’ heads. It is indeed one of
the world’s masterpieces of armor.
Although the Greeks made their armor out of bronze, they did have
knowledge of iron, at least as early as the fifth century B.C. But it
was extremely difficult for them to prepare, as they had not yet
discovered efficient methods of smelting it from iron ore, so that what
little they had was very precious. It could not be spared for making
armor, but was restricted to edged weapons where a relatively small
amount of this hard new metal could be most effective. The Romans too
used iron, and as their technical skill improved they used more and more
of it.
After the Roman empire was overwhelmed by the barbarian hordes from the
North the making of fine arms languished. It did not cease; occasionally
discoveries are made of beautifully inlaid sword pommels and shield
bosses belonging to the so-called “dark ages”. Sword blades too turn up
occasionally, skillfully constructed of many layers of alternately hard
steel and soft iron, so that they may retain a keen cutting edge yet
still be tough rather than brittle.
[Illustration: _Fig. 5. Embossed bronze disk, probably the central
reinforcement of a leather shield, from Picenum, East-Central Italy,
second half VII century B. C._]
[Illustration: _Fig. 6. An Etruscan warrior in battle dress. Note
the rivets on the helmet crest._]
(Steel, you will remember, is not a separate metal; it is just iron
which contains from about .5% to about 2.5%, of carbon. This gives it
the peculiar property that if it is heated to redness and quickly
cooled, it becomes much harder than before. It also becomes more
brittle. If hardened steel be heated a second time, not red hot but to a
much lower temperature, and again chilled, the hardness is reduced
somewhat, while the brittleness is reduced a great deal; the metal
becomes tough and suitable for making into tools. This second heating
and chilling is called “tempering”. Contrary to popular belief, “to
temper” steel does not mean “to make it harder”. It means “to make fully
hardened steel somewhat softer and much tougher”. If the iron has too
much or too little carbon it cannot be hardened at all; if there is too
little it is very soft and malleable and is called “wrought iron”. If
there is too much carbon it is harder than mild steel, but is very
brittle indeed; this is called “cast iron”.)