"Dark Age shield rims..." Topic

Did shields almost always have an metal strip around the rim. If so would this be iron?

What colour do people use?

Latest thinking is that most had leather edging, so a brown.

ok cool thanks

Yep, leather,
But I'd say the vain bastards had coloured leather to go with the rest of their outfits. Earthy reds, greens, off-yellow, and such are probaly cheapest and easiest. White, or black, can look nice.

cavalry red always makes a nice looking red/brown leather

Be careful about colors. I'm no expert, but have recently read the Ospreys on Saxon Thegn,Viking, etc. They say rawhide (which as you know from dog toys, dries hard and "tan"). Their illustrations go with this theory.

Hi,

Used to re enact with Regia Anglorum and all our shiled rims hate to be rawhide so I would recommend a tan colour. My personal opinion is its unlikely to be painted or fancy as even in pracice with blunted weapons it gets smacked to bits and has to be replaced fairly regularly.

Doh Should read "Had to be Rawhide"

even in pracice with blunted weapons it gets smacked to bits and has to be replaced fairly regularly

I am a re-enactor too and not sure about this. Real warriors did not go into real battle as often as modern re-enactors go to mock battles, and even when they did they did not spend all their week-end hacking at their opponent's shield as re-enactors do. It lasted a few minutes and after that they were probably dead, so they would have wanted the finest shield and shield-rim they could get? They probably had another shield for training.

Thanks guys :)

I think the best guess from archaeological and historical evidence is that rawhide may have been most common. Leather and Iron were probably used as well.

So paint your figures how you want…..

Both of course. In what proportions, nobody can say. As metal work was far more expensive than leather work, I'd say that the rich had metal rims and the less plush had rawhide. And sure, anyone with a few days to kick around is going to paint his stuff….