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Very interesting, I wonder what became of that dig...somewhere, was it Egypt, where they found Alexander's final tomb (likely)...I read an old article about it and then there was zilch... I can't find anything online about the site. Which is even weirder...
I remember trying to do that just for art and it wasnt that hard but e.g there is a guy called mosevic or his brand is called like that anyway he makes handmade sunglass skeletons from denim that he presses with glue or whatnot and the end result is rock solid judging of how hard these are then surely there is something into it depending on what type of glue you use and craftsmanship in general...
Will you pass this to Mr. Gregory Aldrete? - The Latin term "Graecus" was introduced by Romans two centuries AFTER the death of Alexander the Great! No "Greex" whatsoever in his time.
Layers of linen cloth glued together is essentially a precursor to carbon fiber and Kevlar. Samurai armor was Los made from layering and weaving multiple materials together.
@@zemog1025 Yes. Ive seen several accounts from Mongolia, China and Thailand of Silk armor. Silk is considerably stronger than steel of the same diameter...not sure how much that means, would a suit of tightly woven steel wool work. It certainly would have rusted quickly. I got to spend time in a Thai temple where there were a bunch of older ladies still weaving silk sarongs. The pulled the silk thread, dyed it with plants, minerals, soils and wove it on traditional looms.. Those threads are so so thin, but quite strong, and when they weave them into the very thick dense well made silk fabrics, the thread count is ridiculous. You dont count silk by thread count, but quality of the silk, but its so dense, that it seems 1/4" of silk thoroughly woven tight would make a decent armor and be really light as well
I'd be willing to bet they used resins instead of glues to laminate. Glues, such as hide, rabbit, fish are collagen based and soluble in water. Easy to saturate fabric and harden, but would degrade with rain, sweat, etc. They would have plant resins and gums from pine, frankincense, amber, copal, and urishol and shellac from the east in India and China. These are soluble in alcohol spirits or pitch turpentines along with heat. Once cured the resin would be durable and impervious to water degrading.✌
Scratch that urishol lacquer. The rest are a fair speculation, but nobody would choose a (foreign) resin that causes a dermatitis reaction to the majority of its wearers. Further, consider parsimony; soldiers would be making and repairing armor on site, which means that they would more likely prefer to use local trees than carry stores of resin with them. The fires were already in place, so fresh tar extraction would've been a relatively simple process. Plus, fresh stuff is already hot, and thus runny enough to saturate fabric.
Smart. I'm 61 years old. I started studying the life of Alexander the Great when I was 21. No other individual in all of human history was more extraordinary. Julius Caesar knew this. Napoleon knew this. There are two books I highly recommend: 'The Nature of Alexander' by Mary Renault and 'Alexander the Great: King, Commander, and Statesman' by N.G.L. Hammond. Both are excellent -- the first being a more psychological perspective, while the second provides insight into Alexander's strategic, tactical, and political genius.
In American prisons, guards pay attention when newspapers, magazines, and scrap cardboard disappear- it means a war is about to start. Prisoners glue the paper together into tight sheets for a homemade stab-proof armor.
In terms of science skills, Romans were incredible hydrologists. In Northern Spain there was a miles long aqueduct from high in the Mountains, which they used to explode a gold filled area. They drilled holes into the area such that they had a wide opening that went down to a very narrow endpoint. When they let the water go into the aqueduct from a lake, the pressure just exploded the area up and made the gold much easier to get. The area is still worked by the Spanish, it is obviously so gold rich.
@@LaughingMan44 Perhaps not nowadays but I highly doubt the ancient Romans even distinguished between engineering and engineering science like we do today. Ancient engineers had to do all the work, science included.
The mongols used silk. Even if only wearing a silk shirt, an arrow would take the shirt into the wound without the silk tearing and breaking off ( the small bits of material caused the subsequent infections that killed you.). So with the silk unbroken the warrior could pull the arrow out ( even some barbed arrows) as the silk formed a kind of glove around the arrow head. Now take multi layer glued vests and it was akin to Kevlar.
Speaking of the Mongols. Did you know there are 20 million decedent's of Ghangis Khan alive today. A chronic philosopher he wasn't. No MeTo movement back then.
@@GarthOJ yes, kind of. I was head of the RAF military College in the UK. One of the new cadets who joined to be an officer had researched and done this as part of her Masters Degree. Whilst she was going through the course i had to give her an award as the UK Police started using the system to make stab proof vests. I had long chats with her about Genghis, the Mongols and silk. All i have, never researched it more but it worked.
@@skeletalfluorosis 👏🏻 ‘every days a school day’ ! You just never know when this kind of thing may happen, and you give us a top tip incase you are not wearing your multi layered silk shirt 👍
I used this book to recreate and test the armor with my high school students. It was a great time and the kids were really great at the hands-on history.
I have worn modern steel armor plates that were 9.75 lb each for a total of almost 20lb and lemme tell you, it doesn't sound like a lot but it sure feels like it after a while. Cutting even that in half would be huge
@@RealFuzzyPickLE530 I hear what you're saying but you also don't have the same physicality of someone who trained in and wore such armour to battle. It became part of them. Obviously if they wore lighter armour they'd probably prefer it, but you say "after a while" like you're wearing it for a hard day. Whereas soldiers who would have worn such armour as part of their kit would likely get far more used to it after a while, meaning the years of their life they would be wearing it. If they're lucky to survive anyway.
That's just the plates. The modern infantry combined weighs anywhere from 80 to 90 lbs. Couple that with the long sleeves and pants and helmets it makes for alot of discomfort. Not including your weapon and any pack you may be carrying including a camelbak with water. It's pretty tough in a desert. During the initial invasion into Iraq we were full MOP gear as well and that was just misery.
@@Bluebark64FIS The Greek stuff was pretty sciency... especially considering that the Greeks invented science and the Japanese had to be taught science...
ever hit a pinata with a stick? I'm just saying if youre wearing paper mache into battle you're probably not doing any hand to hand combat especially with spears and swords bro had protection called the somatophylakes. 7 of the most bad ass mother effers the empire had to offer. I doubt their kit was glue and linen.
@@skullbong Lol what are you talking about dude? Layering linen with glue would be extremely resistant to slashes and stabs especially over chain mail.
@@EpictetusAuraliusAlexander consider himself Greek. All Macedonians considered themselves Greeks. They didn’t develop the linothorax. The linothorax was developed by the southern Greek city states.
@@EpictetusAuralius Macedonians are a Greek tribe dude, the same way that you have people from Ohio still being part of the US or Yorkshire speaking English (well, sort of on the second one)
There's an Ancient Macedonian 4th century BC grave where they found what looks like an iron version of the linothorax armor. The shape and protective sheets are all the same, but "replicated" in iron. Some people think it originally belonged to Philip II, Alexander's father.
It was very well managed by Alexander it had strengths and weaknesses and Alexander was great in utilising the strentgsh ans protecting the wesknesses.
This is so interesting to me as I am currently researching the manufacture of musical instruments, violins specifically, using a flax based woven material called Amplitex (which is being used to make automotive parts instead of plastics and carbon fiber composites). I have made my own stable bioplastics using starches and other simple ingredients and plan on using this as the resin to bind the woven fibres which would then be compressed in a mold.
@@martinr2040 the resultant composite will be nothing like well aged quarter sawn alpine spruce carefully carved. It’s more an experiment in molding something small with some strength to it than anything else before I use it to mold larger parts for velomobile shrouds.
@@zenape619 not yet as I am still trying out resins to bind the composite. There are different weaves that will affect how the panels resonate besides their shape. I’m taking some inspiration from Ovation guitars which have a fiberglass type compose back plus some makers of carbon fiber cellos and violins. IMO CF is not the best stuff in general as it’s completely non recyclable but it’s very useful. These new vegetable fibre composites with bio resins are the future of this type of manufacturing. The car industry is doing a lot of research into this especially. The expected sound will be a more mellow one than a CF violin but that’s based on using some commercial resins. I want to make my own plastic/glue/resin binders and have successfully made some that have been stable for almost 10 years - I can vary the hardness of the bioplastic from very flexible and rubbery to glassy hard that would shatter. It’s very easy to make bioplastics at home.
I'm not surprised a horse rider would have light armor when for example we had Mesoamericans using quilted cotton armor that even the conquistadors adopted. Light armor is really good.
@@Adrian-vy5vn Let me quote You. "Lol No" Conquistadors despite the armor still got fucked up initially. They weren't accustomed to the guerilla style of fighting the natives did. Steel armor was extremely hot and made navigating a jungle difficult as you couldn't always be on a horse. Armor shortages were also a contributing factor. Once they saw that native armor was good enough against native weapons, and lighter it was a no Brainer. Remember that not all conquistadors wore full armor anyway or Armor at all for that matter because unlike the modern military you weren't issued armor it had to be purchased.
@@Adrian-vy5vnsame reason modern soldiers sometimes take off their armor when moving long distances or in difficult terrain for extended periods of time. Body armor can’t help you if you have heatstroke.
Thank you for bringing this to the general attention. Yes, some of the South American indigenous populations had good armor and tactics. Only lacking steel weapons to make a reasonably fair fight out of it. Horses and firearms were out of their realm.
@@MMXX_CE " still got fucked up initially" ? They literally won every initial engagement and won basically every single battle they fought in Mesoamerica? You also don't have to be on horseback to wear steel armor, nor is it that much hotter than fucking woven fabric in like 30 layers like Mesoamerican armor, both are hot as balls
We tested linothorax ages ago - at least 12 years ago, using a 60lb draw bow and arrowheads the same shape as the bronze age ones. Penetration was just enough to prick the skin but no more. We were, needless to say, impressed.
War, after survival itself, is one of the primary drivers of technology. But it's interesting also to imagine how this material may have been used for other purposes that we have no examples of.
As a sailor and boatbuilder-and if this will be of any help-there are companies in our industry who use flax fiber and organic epoxy (glue, essentially) to create bio-composite boats. The modern day bio epoxy, or process of creating it might have some similarities to what the Macedonians and Greeks used, as there are recipes of this that can be created at home. Mr. Aldrete might already know this, as their book (which I have yet to read), will probably be well researched. But I am sharing anyway. The companies I am referring to are Greenboats and BComp. There have also been people back in the early 60s who created entire car bodies from flax fiber and bio epoxy. These are more on the engineering sector, but science and engineering usually go hand-in-hand. On the sailboats that we race, there are a lot of modern day hardware that are essentially re-discovered “old” or even “ancient” tech.
Keep in mind, the Greeks and Macedonians would have probably had some secrets to the production as well. For example, we still dont know how they made Greek fire, so they could have had all kinds of secret ingredients to make a linothorax
when you see the history most of the greek was controll by Ottoman Empire, only place Ottoman empire failed was Albania they had this hero called Skenderbeg, ottoman failed to occupie Albania for over 30 years, he saved all west Europe Greek Balkan from Ottoman empire
Excellent podcast ! An interesting tale that took place in the aftermath of the Battle of Granicus, is the following; Being the first impactful defeat that Alexander the Great offered the Persians, after establishing the “Hellenic League” and launching a unified Greek counteroffensive against the Persian Empire, 150 years after the legendary battles of Thermopylae, Salamis, Plataea and Mycale, Alexander remained respectful and treated the dead from both parties with great military honours after the battle. According to Arrian, he also ordered to be sent back to Athens, 300 suits of full Persian armour (honouring the monumental last stand of the 300 Spartans in Thermopylae), as an offering to Goddess Athena, in order to be hung on the Acropolis with the following inscription in Greek: “Alexander, son of Philip, and all Greeks, present this offering from the spoils taken from the foreigners inhabiting Asia.” The rest is history…
As an armorer myself. making a linothorax has always been and interesting mystery as far as materials and construction is concerned. It's hard enough to source proper bronze to hammer out a Corinthian helmet!
People we have to understand that the rise of podcasts like this have given voice to the nerds. The nerds have the answers because they have actually looked into something wholeheartedly with interest. When have you ever looked into something so deeply with interest?
Unfortunately actual scholars aren't nearly as popular as people like Graham Hancock and the other grifters and anti science rhetoric peddlers you see on garbage pods like JRE.
Sadly it also gives a voice to specific people, not necessarily with the most up to date data. While this guy's research was very important to the field, the glued linen construction has largely been put into question by academics
It's also easy to carry multiples of each component: you could easily repair it yourself once the battle is over, whereas you need a blacksmith to repair metal armors.
Not necessarily. Roman Lorica Segmentata was just a series of iron bands, of various sizes, which is part of what makes it so ingenious. Smiths can make the bands day in and out, and then when a soldier needs to be armoured he goes to the smith, who takes his measurements selects the appropriate size bands and assembles the armour. It’s just as simple to repair.
Tod Cutler did an entire episode on glue-impregnated leather armor. It turned out to be surprisingly good. I can easily see laminated cloth being effective.
Just passing by to say Macedonians were Greeks, just like Spartans, Athenians, Cretans, Megarians, Arcadians, Faecians, Thessalonians, etc. Greeks, not Slavs. Slavs came around the area about 1000 years after Alexander's death
The persians used layers of glued silk. Stops hits, slashes and stabs perfectly. You cant repair it, but its about surviving one battle and not about prsenting it in a museum 2000 years later. These kinds of armor are light and keep you cool in the heat and warm in the cold. Compare that to any kind of metal armor
The glue also trapped attacking weapons, allowing the wearer to charge the enemy ranks like a hedgehog. Covered in blades he could wreak havoc by wriggling on the ground.
@@VincentAnzalone alexander did have a male lover, hephaestion, and also took darius' favorite eunuch to bed. everyone was hella gay until industrialization, basically. next time ur literally anywhere in europe, the middle east, asia, or northern africa, turn a blacc light on.
Right on! Those sources are where it's at! And not just when it comes to objects, but for religious traditions, political and philosophical traditions, the authenticity of authorship and truth as to the actual existence of famous and/or revered literary figures... The list goes on and on and on.
This is a Great discussion! The fact he recreated it is awesome. I bet it would make fantastic under armor as well. Comfortable yet double up the protection
I find it pretty cool of the repeat in history from the greek to roman transition with how and where the armor was worn to modern day with the advent of soft kevlar vests being the best frontline protection to it being used as a secondary form of protection behind hard ar500 or ceramic ballistic plates in use at the front today.
It would probably have served well as an underlayer for larger armor pieces that would otherwise go unworn on the day to day basis when one is not fighting in some war or battle, but still wants to be battle ready in a moments notice. It would look nice enough to serve well enough for use in public, but still be strong enough to serve some defense in the case of being caught unawares. Then, you only put the other armor on, when the situation requires it. If it requires it, or if you even have any. Best case scenario of having said extra armor, but somehow it fails anyways, is that under layer is now there to help reduce the damage caused.
@@ManuFortis that’s was the subarmalis in Roman years or the highly debated spolas of the Greeks. Basically a quilted gambeson like tight to form long T-shirt sometimes with pteryges which was worn under the bronze thorax as extra protection and also helped with chafing.
It’s likely that Alexander preferred the linothorax not only because he was a short and lightweight guy, relatively speaking, but because so many of his campaigns took place in very hot climates. Also he did not have to fight on foot, but a-horseback. He loved and valued his horse, and would have wanted to avoid tiring his steed. Also, he was probably normally surrounded by a fair few guards on horseback. I’ll try to get a copy of your book. I’m kind of into the merits of linen anyway. My most comfortable pair of pants are made of linen-cool in summer, warm in winter.
Natural Shellac probably would of been the hardest natural substance they would of had access to. Also false that you cant sharpen bronze to the same sharpness of early Iron. It can be sharpened sharper than early Iron, but dulls much more easily.
@@Bialy_1 Cast bronze you can tool harden it by hitting the edge. Its been proven already by many it cuts as good or better than iron. You wont get a sharper edge than hardened bronze until you get into higher quality steel. I dont know where you got your information from. Sharpness is NOT how well a edge holds after a few cuts.
Linothorax is a GOATed armor. Even the early Republic of Rome up into the Punic Wars used the Linothorax. Thing stopped arrows from some of the strongest bows of the Iron Age. The whole thing was even lighter than a bronze chest piece the early Romans would use for light armor, yet just as strong and covered more of the body and was flexible after being broken in. Not going to lie though, the early Italic tribes had some crazy good drip with those multi-piece bronze plates over their cloth outfits, and their helmet designs were beautiful, just as the Greeks helmet designs were. The Greeks and Romans even borrowed from each other in armor designs. They were right nextdoor to each other the WHOLE time, after all. Chalcidian and Attic helmets are quite drippy. Much more so than the Corinthian helmets in my opinion. Especially when decoratives are added such as plumes or feathers or both.
The hint comes at the end. People expecting the armor to have technological advantages miss the point. The armor was made primarily for lion hunting. Alexander was a notorious lion hunter. They didnt win the battles because of the superiority of their armor. They won because they were macedonian lionhunters, the ultimate greek warriors, greater than even the spartans. The significance of the armor lays in it being the uniform of the macedonian lionhunters.
@@JustAnotherApeFromPlanetEarth thats not what it says at all. it only became a lion hunting armor when it became outdated for front line military use. it was a superior armor because of it being lightweight and having the same resistance as the metal armor their opponents used. only once front line weapons were advanced enough to pierce this armor, it became useless.
Lemme get the show started: Alexander the Great was Greek from Greek parents. His mother claimed ancestry from Heraklis. Had a greek meaning name, like his mother and his father. His famed generals, greek names. After Alexanders death the empire was split between the generals and ended by the romans nearly 300 years later. Until then the Greek ruling class was speaking, what else, Greek. Because every empire in the world has spread out their language. The english english The spanish spanish The portuguese portuguese The french french etc etc etc When the Greeks gathered against Persia Alexander honored all except the Spartans who didnt follow. When the Persian King wrote a letter to Alexander seeking terms Alexander reminded him with his response of the suffering the persians caused the Greek states. And denied terms. When Alexander visited Egypt the priests to impress him, addressed him in Greek and called him by mistake PaeDios (in Greek child of Zeus) instead of PaeDion (child). Remember he was young, yet a conqueror/liberator. Now recently cleopatra was portraited as black. The egyptians got angry and said stop altering history. She was greek. So Alexander died at sround 323bc, Cleopatra at 30bc. 300 years after that Rome split in 2 and the eastern part had greek nobility. Slavic tribes settled in the balkans at around 550ce or so from the east due to the mongolians displacing turkic people, and the turkic ppl displaced the slavs. Most of the slavs formed their proud countries, but some decided (in order to avoid being over-run by albanians (ancient illirians) bulgarians (turkic) serbians (slavic) to call themselves "mAcEDoNiAnS". So they came from far away, some 800 years later, settled nowhere near Pella (Filipos' capital), speak bulgarian, with some slavic words, but insist that they are "mAcEdOnIAns" and that their language is long lost/gone. My house was 1.5h away from Pella, and all the Makedonian antiquities have greek writting, which I as I Greek can read. All over the countries that alexander travelled there are relics in greek. Not bulgarian, not slavic, not "mAcEDoNIAn". Athenians didnt speak Athenian, Spartans didnt speak Spartan. They spoke greek. Makedones spoke Greek. Greek traditions, Greek religion. Greeks. So.. if some people from Vietnam go to texas in 800 years and settle nowhere near Alamo, can they say that Texans arent americans, and that they are Texans and they speak Texan and that Alamo and its historical figures are part of their culture, not the americans? Lemme try again, some people from Zambia, go and settle in Castillona Spain, nowhere near Vivar, say Castillians arent spanish but they are and El Cid is their hero and their Culture. I am tired of these people calling themselves "maCeDonIAns". They are appropriating my culture. Makedones were Greeks. It was a Greek kingdom like sparta and many others that may not be well known. Today they go by "North Macedonia" whilst more than half their population is Albanian. For political reasons to prevent countries like Bulgaria and Albania from developing, these people were given all the diplomatic supporr to create conflict in the balkans and at the expense of my countries history. Next time someone says "I am mAcEDoNiAn" ask them, why are speaking Boulgarian and why did Alexander spread Greek (like every empire does). I had to share this with you. Times are changing all over the world. The lies are exposed left and right.
Makedonia is not Greece. Unlike Greece Makedon is a distinct nation with a national identity that has been distinct from the Hellenes since well before the time of Alexander. Many Hellenes during the time of both Phillip II and Alexander III considered Makedones to be civilized, yet drunken, but by no means Hellenic. Makedonian script and language is not congruent with Classical Greek, and (like the culture and people) exists distinctly so and is not a Hellenic subset that neither Alexander nor Aristotle would recognize. The biggest difference is also that "Greece" as a nation doesn't really exist until the 1800s, whereas Makedon had been a kingdom for centuries before Alexander III and has managed to preserve a national identity until the fall of the Romans in 1453, only to be reborn (with a different ethnic admixture) after the Second World War. Makedon is more real of a nation than Greece is. Alexander was no Hellene
I want to see Todd's workshop do some testing with this armor against longbows. It would be interesting to see the comparison in the different cultural technologies.
Having written about floods I would suggest he investigate Randall Carlson's theory of the Younger Dryas impact and the resulting floods in north America
Thank you this is a great piece of research, recreation of ancient technology gives deep insight and understanding on how ancient people lived and thought and the limitations they were subject to
I agree, however silk was highly expensive. A luxury commodity a poor Greek farmer would not have access to. It would not be until the end of 19th century someone would make a protective vest (essentially a gambeson) out of silk as protection against bullets. I honestly don't if ancient China, with it's historical abundance of silk, ever dabbled in armor made purely of silk. A part of me says they probably did.
A Silk layer is useless, there is no period account of it being worn as armor. You need more than 10 layers for that. No, mongols didnt wear "silk shirts that wrapped around the arrows", that's a myth, It's been tested, it doesn’t work, and having fabric in a wound is bad.
Just so you are aware the father of modern Psychotherapy was a man who killed women with cocaine simply trying to work out their menstrual cycles as well as perfecting his craft by trying to convince children they had not in fact been abused and raped by the rich elite pedophiles within Austrian Society. You probably refer to him as Sigmund freud. The man whose nephew became the father of modern propaganda in America. Therapy is for the weak minded and the gullible and naive.
AS a general area of historical research, the whole landscape of materials technology is a hot topic. We don't know many things about the past, trying to recreate them helps us understand, and appreciate , the level of skill for any given historic period. This is particularly true the further back in time we go.
Greek Warriors had family armor so they’d pass it down to the next generation… if you have great body armor you survive the battle. Not sure they’d write it down so we could learn about it reading books like school girls a couple thousand years later.
@@AlexanderMoen- actually it doesn’t because it was made of linen and glue. That’s the entire point in this one. If the armor did survive then it could be studied but the warriors didn’t make it for that reason.
@@riddell74 Don't worry you didn't, I have issues understanding context at times and was genuinely trying to clarify your meaning as it seemed at odds with professing knowledge of ancient Greece as that surely requires the reading of books? 🤷👍
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Very interesting, I wonder what became of that dig...somewhere, was it Egypt, where they found Alexander's final tomb (likely)...I read an old article about it and then there was zilch... I can't find anything online about the site. Which is even weirder...
A welders apron and some fiberglass epoxy resin poured over it= thank me after it stops a bullet
Lex why did mass block people on X; I’ve never interacted with you on any platform but yet I am blocked.
I remember trying to do that just for art and it wasnt that hard but e.g there is a guy called mosevic or his brand is called like that anyway he makes handmade sunglass skeletons from denim that he presses with glue or whatnot and the end result is rock solid judging of how hard these are then surely there is something into it depending on what type of glue you use and craftsmanship in general...
Will you pass this to Mr. Gregory Aldrete? - The Latin term "Graecus" was introduced by Romans two centuries AFTER the death of Alexander the Great! No "Greex" whatsoever in his time.
Layers of linen cloth glued together is essentially a precursor to carbon fiber and Kevlar. Samurai armor was Los made from layering and weaving multiple materials together.
Mongols used layers silk to limit penetration by arrow heads.
@@zemog1025 Yes. Ive seen several accounts from Mongolia, China and Thailand of Silk armor.
Silk is considerably stronger than steel of the same diameter...not sure how much that means, would a suit of tightly woven steel wool work. It certainly would have rusted quickly.
I got to spend time in a Thai temple where there were a bunch of older ladies still weaving silk sarongs. The pulled the silk thread, dyed it with plants, minerals, soils and wove it on traditional looms..
Those threads are so so thin, but quite strong, and when they weave them into the very thick dense well made silk fabrics, the thread count is ridiculous. You dont count silk by thread count, but quality of the silk, but its so dense, that it seems 1/4" of silk thoroughly woven tight would make a decent armor and be really light as well
Anyone whose ever watched “Forged in Fire” knows that lots of materials can stop a sword…not just metal
The ancients understood layering......just did not have the materials we do today
@@zemog1025 mongol historian TheJackMeister debunked this idea on his youtube channel, he explains the origin of this missunderstanding?
I'd be willing to bet they used resins instead of glues to laminate. Glues, such as hide, rabbit, fish are collagen based and soluble in water. Easy to saturate fabric and harden, but would degrade with rain, sweat, etc. They would have plant resins and gums from pine, frankincense, amber, copal, and urishol and shellac from the east in India and China. These are soluble in alcohol spirits or pitch turpentines along with heat. Once cured the resin would be durable and impervious to water degrading.✌
Scratch that urishol lacquer. The rest are a fair speculation, but nobody would choose a (foreign) resin that causes a dermatitis reaction to the majority of its wearers. Further, consider parsimony; soldiers would be making and repairing armor on site, which means that they would more likely prefer to use local trees than carry stores of resin with them. The fires were already in place, so fresh tar extraction would've been a relatively simple process. Plus, fresh stuff is already hot, and thus runny enough to saturate fabric.
Damn yall are smart
Nice. 👍🏻
And a protective styled gambeson of some kind would likely be worn underneath the armor as well.
Colophon city produced the Greek pitch, known today as rosin. It is still used for glues apart from violins
Dude I'm so stoked about all the new Alexander videos on TH-cam past couple months. I'm obsessed with Alexander
Same his conquest of bactria and Afghanistan was insane
"He is Alexande!? No Im Alexander, the most meanest..."
Smart. I'm 61 years old. I started studying the life of Alexander the Great when I was 21. No other individual in all of human history was more extraordinary. Julius Caesar knew this. Napoleon knew this. There are two books I highly recommend: 'The Nature of Alexander' by Mary Renault and 'Alexander the Great: King, Commander, and Statesman' by N.G.L. Hammond. Both are excellent -- the first being a more psychological perspective, while the second provides insight into Alexander's strategic, tactical, and political genius.
He's even mentioned/alluded to/prophesied about in the Book of Daniel
I assume you've already listened to Dan Carlin's "Mania for Subjugation" episode?
In American prisons, guards pay attention when newspapers, magazines, and scrap cardboard disappear- it means a war is about to start. Prisoners glue the paper together into tight sheets for a homemade stab-proof armor.
Better they laminate the sheets 😅
"Homemade"?
Like Omar in The Wire.
I watch national geographics too, and that fact is correct.
Armor and weapons. Former prisoner showed me how to roll up newspapers to make a very rigid club.
Thanks guys. I needed a break from thinking about the Roman Empire.
😆
Carthaginian spy detected
No you should always think about the Roman Empire…..
False. You never need a break from thinking about Imperium Romanum.
You gay?
In terms of science skills, Romans were incredible hydrologists.
In Northern Spain there was a miles long aqueduct from high in the Mountains, which they used to explode a gold filled area. They drilled holes into the area such that they had a wide opening that went down to a very narrow endpoint. When they let the water go into the aqueduct from a lake, the pressure just exploded the area up and made the gold much easier to get.
The area is still worked by the Spanish, it is obviously so gold rich.
That's not Scientism TM, that's engineering. They were good engineers
Nabataeans and Umayyads did marvels with water too
@@LaughingMan44 Perhaps not nowadays but I highly doubt the ancient Romans even distinguished between engineering and engineering science like we do today. Ancient engineers had to do all the work, science included.
They learned SO much from their time in Egypt ^
@@WolfHeathen Holy shit you don't even know what "SCIENCETM BIG BANG THEORY REDDIT" is
The mongols used silk. Even if only wearing a silk shirt, an arrow would take the shirt into the wound without the silk tearing and breaking off ( the small bits of material caused the subsequent infections that killed you.). So with the silk unbroken the warrior could pull the arrow out ( even some barbed arrows) as the silk formed a kind of glove around the arrow head. Now take multi layer glued vests and it was akin to Kevlar.
Speaking of the Mongols. Did you know there are 20 million decedent's of Ghangis Khan alive today. A chronic philosopher he wasn't. No MeTo movement back then.
I heard that was debunked, got any more info on this?
@@GarthOJ yes, kind of. I was head of the RAF military College in the UK. One of the new cadets who joined to be an officer had researched and done this as part of her Masters Degree. Whilst she was going through the course i had to give her an award as the UK Police started using the system to make stab proof vests. I had long chats with her about Genghis, the Mongols and silk. All i have, never researched it more but it worked.
@@dellingson4833had two jobs, conquer & lay pipe
@@skeletalfluorosis 👏🏻 ‘every days a school day’ ! You just never know when this kind of thing may happen, and you give us a top tip incase you are not wearing your multi layered silk shirt 👍
I trust this guy, "Gregory" sounds like he knows his stuff... plus he has a retro Casio watch.
That bracelet will rip all your hair
@@oreocarlton3343 but then you have a smooth valley for it to sit in
Yes the chrome too
@@oreocarlton3343No that’s a smooth Rolex band.
That’s a cheap stock Casio band
History is such an underrated and under appreciated piece of knowledge
I'm coming back here because I just finished like 24hrs of this guys amazing lectures, thanks lex for introducing me to this guy!
this guy is awesome
We think you’re awesome 💪🏻
and Lex is BORING AF and quite dumb
I used this book to recreate and test the armor with my high school students. It was a great time and the kids were really great at the hands-on history.
11lbs instead of 26lbs seems like a huge difference to be lugging around
I have worn modern steel armor plates that were 9.75 lb each for a total of almost 20lb and lemme tell you, it doesn't sound like a lot but it sure feels like it after a while. Cutting even that in half would be huge
@@RealFuzzyPickLE530 I hear what you're saying but you also don't have the same physicality of someone who trained in and wore such armour to battle. It became part of them. Obviously if they wore lighter armour they'd probably prefer it, but you say "after a while" like you're wearing it for a hard day. Whereas soldiers who would have worn such armour as part of their kit would likely get far more used to it after a while, meaning the years of their life they would be wearing it. If they're lucky to survive anyway.
That's just the plates. The modern infantry combined weighs anywhere from 80 to 90 lbs. Couple that with the long sleeves and pants and helmets it makes for alot of discomfort. Not including your weapon and any pack you may be carrying including a camelbak with water. It's pretty tough in a desert. During the initial invasion into Iraq we were full MOP gear as well and that was just misery.
In the 🇺🇸 Infantry we always said ounces matter. Full battle rattle + other gear n weapons. It ALL adds up
@@simply11believelane47 ounces equals pounds, pounds equals pain
I watched Gregory Aldrete on The Great Courses and I thought he was one of their best lecturers.
That's saying something - a lot of good lecturers there. 👍
This conversation is THE richest source of Lex Clips known to man
For real. I keep watching individual clips. The whole conversation deserves a listen apparently.
What's so amazing about this conversation it's basically ancient Kevlar not that incredible really
@@diztens4678is that not interesting?
@@Maso999it is if you love classical antiquity
@@diztens4678 Yea totally not interesting they had kevlar armor 2500+ years ago. How can you be so intellectually incurious?
it sounds like an ancient kevlar
Composite armour isn't as new as you think, the Chinese had something similar centuries ago
And the Japanese Samurai.
Or micarta
@@jktekkerz8735 And you know the Japanese...they scienced the hell out of it. Took it to an art form, like everything they did.
@@Bluebark64FIS The Greek stuff was pretty sciency... especially considering that the Greeks invented science and the Japanese had to be taught science...
I love coming across an esoteric historical mystery that’s so well explored!
Thanks.
flax+glue would likely result in something like modern day conveyor belts, which are often used as improvised armor on vehicles
Flax is used today with modern resin and epoxies in place of modern fibers. Strong enough for furniture and looks really nice.
Gluing the linen sounds a lot like using fiberglass fabric with epoxy which is very tough and used in autobody.
Ancient composites
ever hit a pinata with a stick? I'm just saying if youre wearing paper mache into battle you're probably not doing any hand to hand combat especially with spears and swords bro had protection called the somatophylakes. 7 of the most bad ass mother effers the empire had to offer. I doubt their kit was glue and linen.
@@skullbong Lol what are you talking about dude? Layering linen with glue would be extremely resistant to slashes and stabs especially over chain mail.
@@skullbong it was very very effective. they used it for a reason.
@skullbong, that's paper and a low layer count at that.
Wow the Macedonians must have suffered way less fatigue than their opponents by the time they actually met on the battlefield.
*Greeks
@@fekupno OP is right. Alexander was leader of Macedonia. Hegemon of Greece. He subjugated the greeks.
@@EpictetusAuraliusAlexander consider himself Greek. All Macedonians considered themselves Greeks. They didn’t develop the linothorax. The linothorax was developed by the southern Greek city states.
@@TheBizziniss the greeks considered macedonians as barbarians
@@EpictetusAuralius Macedonians are a Greek tribe dude, the same way that you have people from Ohio still being part of the US or Yorkshire speaking English (well, sort of on the second one)
The anti-assassination vest part is super interesting. Ancient peoples were just as resourceful and intuitive as we are today.
There's an Ancient Macedonian 4th century BC grave where they found what looks like an iron version of the linothorax armor. The shape and protective sheets are all the same, but "replicated" in iron. Some people think it originally belonged to Philip II, Alexander's father.
Source I’d love to look at it
@@JohnSmith13334 There's a book called "Vergina the Royal Tombs", but you can also look up Vergina tomb armor online.
It was lighter and stronger than the enemies armor, Alexander's army was truly terrifying.
It was very well managed by Alexander it had strengths and weaknesses and Alexander was great in utilising the strentgsh ans protecting the wesknesses.
This is so interesting to me as I am currently researching the manufacture of musical instruments, violins specifically, using a flax based woven material called Amplitex (which is being used to make automotive parts instead of plastics and carbon fiber composites). I have made my own stable bioplastics using starches and other simple ingredients and plan on using this as the resin to bind the woven fibres which would then be compressed in a mold.
Good luck!
@@martinr2040 the resultant composite will be nothing like well aged quarter sawn alpine spruce carefully carved. It’s more an experiment in molding something small with some strength to it than anything else before I use it to mold larger parts for velomobile shrouds.
Zis is so interesting
Do you have any recordings of what this sounds like? I bet it's wild.
@@zenape619 not yet as I am still trying out resins to bind the composite. There are different weaves that will affect how the panels resonate besides their shape. I’m taking some inspiration from Ovation guitars which have a fiberglass type compose back plus some makers of carbon fiber cellos and violins. IMO CF is not the best stuff in general as it’s completely non recyclable but it’s very useful. These new vegetable fibre composites with bio resins are the future of this type of manufacturing. The car industry is doing a lot of research into this especially. The expected sound will be a more mellow one than a CF violin but that’s based on using some commercial resins. I want to make my own plastic/glue/resin binders and have successfully made some that have been stable for almost 10 years - I can vary the hardness of the bioplastic from very flexible and rubbery to glassy hard that would shatter. It’s very easy to make bioplastics at home.
I'm not surprised a horse rider would have light armor when for example we had Mesoamericans using quilted cotton armor that even the conquistadors adopted.
Light armor is really good.
Lol no, why would downgrade their steel body armours that made their torso almost invulnerable to most Aztec weapons?
@@Adrian-vy5vn Let me quote You. "Lol No" Conquistadors despite the armor still got fucked up initially. They weren't accustomed to the guerilla style of fighting the natives did. Steel armor was extremely hot and made navigating a jungle difficult as you couldn't always be on a horse. Armor shortages were also a contributing factor. Once they saw that native armor was good enough against native weapons, and lighter it was a no Brainer. Remember that not all conquistadors wore full armor anyway or Armor at all for that matter because unlike the modern military you weren't issued armor it had to be purchased.
@@Adrian-vy5vnsame reason modern soldiers sometimes take off their armor when moving long distances or in difficult terrain for extended periods of time. Body armor can’t help you if you have heatstroke.
Thank you for bringing this to the general attention. Yes, some of the South American indigenous populations had good armor and tactics. Only lacking steel weapons to make a reasonably fair fight out of it. Horses and firearms were out of their realm.
@@MMXX_CE " still got fucked up initially" ? They literally won every initial engagement and won basically every single battle they fought in Mesoamerica? You also don't have to be on horseback to wear steel armor, nor is it that much hotter than fucking woven fabric in like 30 layers like Mesoamerican armor, both are hot as balls
We tested linothorax ages ago - at least 12 years ago, using a 60lb draw bow and arrowheads the same shape as the bronze age ones. Penetration was just enough to prick the skin but no more. We were, needless to say, impressed.
But during a Malian raid, he was wounded deeply via an Indian arrow
@@mamdhata1614 Totally possible - linothorax gives good protection for its time but it covers only the thorax!
@@mamdhata1614 Which hit him where?
@@vipertwenty249 Raid on the tribe of Malians in India. Penetrated his armour in the chest. Fought and won and fell ill thereafter.
War, after survival itself, is one of the primary drivers of technology. But it's interesting also to imagine how this material may have been used for other purposes that we have no examples of.
As a sailor and boatbuilder-and if this will be of any help-there are companies in our industry who use flax fiber and organic epoxy (glue, essentially) to create bio-composite boats.
The modern day bio epoxy, or process of creating it might have some similarities to what the Macedonians and Greeks used, as there are recipes of this that can be created at home.
Mr. Aldrete might already know this, as their book (which I have yet to read), will probably be well researched. But I am sharing anyway.
The companies I am referring to are Greenboats and BComp.
There have also been people back in the early 60s who created entire car bodies from flax fiber and bio epoxy.
These are more on the engineering sector, but science and engineering usually go hand-in-hand. On the sailboats that we race, there are a lot of modern day hardware that are essentially re-discovered “old” or even “ancient” tech.
Hemp could be far better.
@@SNLandCruisers, yup. The composite car body that was made in the 60's was made with hemp. 😊
I can tell you if a mother must do the armour for her son will be better that any armour of a blacksmith
Same goes with PB&J Sandi's. ❤❤😂😂
Love doesn't make someone instantly into a master craftsman. You're silly.
Keep in mind, the Greeks and Macedonians would have probably had some secrets to the production as well. For example, we still dont know how they made Greek fire, so they could have had all kinds of secret ingredients to make a linothorax
Macedonians were Greeks as well....
No, the Macedonian conquered Greece Greeks were Macedonians
@@MK-bc5ubhaha sure buddy.
@@MK-bc5ub Are you alkoholic man?
when you see the history most of the greek was controll by Ottoman Empire, only place Ottoman empire failed was Albania they had this hero called Skenderbeg, ottoman failed to occupie Albania for over 30 years, he saved all west Europe Greek Balkan from Ottoman empire
I came across this randomly. This is absolutely fascinating. I'll definitely be watching more of your videos
Linothorax, “I speak for the Flax”
Underrated comment
😄And after a long coin drop I just realized... - Flaxmade with several layers is also the Gambeson... 😯
Brilliant person
😂😂
Goood one!
Excellent podcast ! An interesting tale that took place in the aftermath of the Battle of Granicus, is the following;
Being the first impactful defeat that Alexander the Great offered the Persians, after establishing the “Hellenic League” and launching a unified Greek counteroffensive against the Persian Empire, 150 years after the legendary battles of Thermopylae, Salamis, Plataea and Mycale, Alexander remained respectful and treated the dead from both parties with great military honours after the battle.
According to Arrian, he also ordered to be sent back to Athens, 300 suits of full Persian armour (honouring the monumental last stand of the 300 Spartans in Thermopylae), as an offering to Goddess Athena, in order to be hung on the Acropolis with the following inscription in Greek:
“Alexander, son of Philip, and all Greeks, present this offering from the spoils taken from the foreigners inhabiting Asia.”
The rest is history…
As an armorer myself. making a linothorax has always been and interesting mystery as far as materials and construction is concerned. It's hard enough to source proper bronze to hammer out a Corinthian helmet!
Outstanding interview and video! Well done, Lex!
This is one of the most interesting podcasts I've ever heard.
People we have to understand that the rise of podcasts like this have given voice to the nerds. The nerds have the answers because they have actually looked into something wholeheartedly with interest. When have you ever looked into something so deeply with interest?
Nerds are into tech.theyve always had a platform
Unfortunately actual scholars aren't nearly as popular as people like Graham Hancock and the other grifters and anti science rhetoric peddlers you see on garbage pods like JRE.
I am a fellow nerd-like person, so just the other day for me
Sadly it also gives a voice to specific people, not necessarily with the most up to date data. While this guy's research was very important to the field, the glued linen construction has largely been put into question by academics
I've done a lot of research into female human anatomy on the internet.
Guys will see this and say hell yeah 💪🏼
Hell yeah brother
Alexander was gay
@@Techtalk2030 Cope. The ancient greeks and macedionians had clear words for gay lovers and no primary source ever used it when describing Alexander.
@@Techtalk2030 yo momma is gay. Boom roasted.
@@Techtalk2030 pansexual would be the modern term idiot
It's also easy to carry multiples of each component: you could easily repair it yourself once the battle is over, whereas you need a blacksmith to repair metal armors.
Not necessarily.
Roman Lorica Segmentata was just a series of iron bands, of various sizes, which is part of what makes it so ingenious.
Smiths can make the bands day in and out, and then when a soldier needs to be armoured he goes to the smith, who takes his measurements selects the appropriate size bands and assembles the armour. It’s just as simple to repair.
Thank you for this excerpt of the interview!
Tod Cutler did an entire episode on glue-impregnated leather armor. It turned out to be surprisingly good. I can easily see laminated cloth being effective.
His enthusiasm is infectious, great guy who'd make a phenomenal teacher
The linothorax was a step up from the bronze cuirass. A great compromise between protection and mobility.
I’m just reacting too the clips . Finally some Alexander !!!
Just passing by to say Macedonians were Greeks, just like Spartans, Athenians, Cretans, Megarians, Arcadians, Faecians, Thessalonians, etc.
Greeks, not Slavs.
Slavs came around the area about 1000 years after Alexander's death
Still Macedonian. It was their Name for their Kingdom
@@ItalMiser117 Macedonian equals Greek
@@soulander13 Macedonian Kingdom/Macedonian Empire.
@@ItalMiser117 Macedonians are Greeks,not slavs
Correction they could be considered ancient Greeks. Greeks today have been thoroughly romanized then ottomanized then turkified.
I am Greek and I am impressed not only about then project, but for the way the education works over there. I wish it was this way here also
The persians used layers of glued silk. Stops hits, slashes and stabs perfectly. You cant repair it, but its about surviving one battle and not about prsenting it in a museum 2000 years later. These kinds of armor are light and keep you cool in the heat and warm in the cold. Compare that to any kind of metal armor
This was a great podcast. Next to Dan Carlin -- albeit most interviews Lex does are great. This was surprisingly exceptional.
Way cool. Good to see PhD Aldrete running around!
Fascinating! Absolutely fascinating. Thank you both. ATB from Cornwall UK.
The glue also trapped attacking weapons, allowing the wearer to charge the enemy ranks like a hedgehog. Covered in blades he could wreak havoc by wriggling on the ground.
Underrrated
😂
been charge-up the spin first
No
Yeah, no.😂
Lex, bar none, is my favorite interviewer on TH-cam. And there are some great ones. His questions are spot on, no matter who he's interviewing!
4:50 ... bronze what!?
Pause.
Cuirass, its the term for armour that is a brestplate and a backplate fastened together
cuirass. Cure-arse.😂
Shots fired... More like Alexandria the gay
@@VincentAnzalone alexander did have a male lover, hephaestion, and also took darius' favorite eunuch to bed. everyone was hella gay until industrialization, basically. next time ur literally anywhere in europe, the middle east, asia, or northern africa, turn a blacc light on.
Right on! Those sources are where it's at! And not just when it comes to objects, but for religious traditions, political and philosophical traditions, the authenticity of authorship and truth as to the actual existence of famous and/or revered literary figures... The list goes on and on and on.
The Scholar said BC as a correct date discriptive, extra 3 ⭐⭐⭐ on a five star interview. 👏👏👏
This is a Great discussion! The fact he recreated it is awesome. I bet it would make fantastic under armor as well. Comfortable yet double up the protection
Would've made a good Mythbusters episode
This guy is great. Amazing to listen to people who are so enthusiastic about the field they study.
I find it pretty cool of the repeat in history from the greek to roman transition with how and where the armor was worn to modern day with the advent of soft kevlar vests being the best frontline protection to it being used as a secondary form of protection behind hard ar500 or ceramic ballistic plates in use at the front today.
They fast-tracked the re-discovery of a dead craft based on drawings and some ancient Greek texts. That is so damn cool.
Fascinating conversation.
Great job with the podcast. This is the kind of conversation I love, you get to imagine with detail their day to day.
1:00 legend has it, he is also an Iron Maiden fan
I beleave that 🙌🏽🤟🏽🤟🏽🤟🏽🔥
I don't get it.
@@Liefvikerson then you obviously don't listen to Maiden
Loved this episode. Cheers from boston 🍻
It would probably have served well as an underlayer for larger armor pieces that would otherwise go unworn on the day to day basis when one is not fighting in some war or battle, but still wants to be battle ready in a moments notice. It would look nice enough to serve well enough for use in public, but still be strong enough to serve some defense in the case of being caught unawares. Then, you only put the other armor on, when the situation requires it. If it requires it, or if you even have any.
Best case scenario of having said extra armor, but somehow it fails anyways, is that under layer is now there to help reduce the damage caused.
@@ManuFortis that’s was the subarmalis in Roman years or the highly debated spolas of the Greeks. Basically a quilted gambeson like tight to form long T-shirt sometimes with pteryges which was worn under the bronze thorax as extra protection and also helped with chafing.
So amazing !!! Wow, ty for sharing ❤❤❤
You know that Alexander the Greats armor had awesome stats.
Alexander’s penchant for suddenly attacking after long marches, catching his opponents by surprise, makes much more sense now.
However the best armor at the time was worn by the Persian Immortals - scale armor made of Iron.
This was so much fun..thx guys. Kevlar precursor
His Timex watch is timeless. Looks nice.
or casio?
@@zentai5076 smh yes!! casio* :)
Fossil was popular
It’s likely that Alexander preferred the linothorax not only because he was a short and lightweight guy, relatively speaking, but because so many of his campaigns took place in very hot climates. Also he did not have to fight on foot, but a-horseback. He loved and valued his horse, and would have wanted to avoid tiring his steed. Also, he was probably normally surrounded by a fair few guards on horseback.
I’ll try to get a copy of your book. I’m kind of into the merits of linen anyway. My most comfortable pair of pants are made of linen-cool in summer, warm in winter.
Natural Shellac probably would of been the hardest natural substance they would of had access to. Also false that you cant sharpen bronze to the same sharpness of early Iron. It can be sharpened sharper than early Iron, but dulls much more easily.
Nope, with ancient method you would not get the edge of the blade as sharp...
@@Bialy_1 Cast bronze you can tool harden it by hitting the edge. Its been proven already by many it cuts as good or better than iron. You wont get a sharper edge than hardened bronze until you get into higher quality steel. I dont know where you got your information from. Sharpness is NOT how well a edge holds after a few cuts.
@4:52 you gotta have closed captions on😂
I heard it without the captions. Turned them on just to see and yep exactly what I heard lol.
Lol
“Queer-Ass” lol 😊
lmao
That was all kinds of fascinating. I love students that develop obsessions.
Linothorax is a GOATed armor. Even the early Republic of Rome up into the Punic Wars used the Linothorax.
Thing stopped arrows from some of the strongest bows of the Iron Age. The whole thing was even lighter than a bronze chest piece the early Romans would use for light armor, yet just as strong and covered more of the body and was flexible after being broken in.
Not going to lie though, the early Italic tribes had some crazy good drip with those multi-piece bronze plates over their cloth outfits, and their helmet designs were beautiful, just as the Greeks helmet designs were. The Greeks and Romans even borrowed from each other in armor designs. They were right nextdoor to each other the WHOLE time, after all.
Chalcidian and Attic helmets are quite drippy. Much more so than the Corinthian helmets in my opinion. Especially when decoratives are added such as plumes or feathers or both.
Ok boomer
Awesome videos, thanks! Don’t know why TH-cam unsubscribe me from your channel!!
what's so mysterious about Alexander's specifically tho? Seems like pretty standard Greek / proto-Roman armor.
Did you not listen to the video? They spent several minutes talking about that exact thing 😂
The hint comes at the end. People expecting the armor to have technological advantages miss the point. The armor was made primarily for lion hunting. Alexander was a notorious lion hunter. They didnt win the battles because of the superiority of their armor. They won because they were macedonian lionhunters, the ultimate greek warriors, greater than even the spartans. The significance of the armor lays in it being the uniform of the macedonian lionhunters.
@@JustAnotherApeFromPlanetEarth Spartan warriors being great is literally spartan propaganda.
@@JustAnotherApeFromPlanetEarth thats not what it says at all. it only became a lion hunting armor when it became outdated for front line military use. it was a superior armor because of it being lightweight and having the same resistance as the metal armor their opponents used. only once front line weapons were advanced enough to pierce this armor, it became useless.
So glad that there are people out there in the world like this.
:)
I've always found History to be fascinating in it's many & various topics.
Lemme get the show started: Alexander the Great was Greek from Greek parents. His mother claimed ancestry from Heraklis. Had a greek meaning name, like his mother and his father. His famed generals, greek names. After Alexanders death the empire was split between the generals and ended by the romans nearly 300 years later. Until then the Greek ruling class was speaking, what else, Greek. Because every empire in the world has spread out their language.
The english english The spanish spanish The portuguese portuguese The french french etc etc etc When the Greeks gathered against Persia Alexander honored all except the Spartans who didnt follow. When the Persian King wrote a letter to Alexander seeking terms Alexander reminded him with his response of the suffering the persians caused the Greek states. And denied terms.
When Alexander visited Egypt the priests to impress him, addressed him in Greek and called him by mistake PaeDios (in Greek child of Zeus) instead of PaeDion (child). Remember he was young, yet a conqueror/liberator. Now recently cleopatra was portraited as black. The egyptians got angry and said stop altering history. She was greek. So Alexander died at sround 323bc, Cleopatra at 30bc. 300 years after that Rome split in 2 and the eastern part had greek nobility.
Slavic tribes settled in the balkans at around 550ce or so from the east due to the mongolians displacing turkic people, and the turkic ppl displaced the slavs. Most of the slavs formed their proud countries, but some decided (in order to avoid being over-run by albanians (ancient illirians) bulgarians (turkic) serbians (slavic) to call themselves "mAcEDoNiAnS".
So they came from far away, some 800 years later, settled nowhere near Pella (Filipos' capital), speak bulgarian, with some slavic words, but insist that they are "mAcEdOnIAns" and that their language is long lost/gone. My house was 1.5h away from Pella, and all the Makedonian antiquities have greek writting, which I as I Greek can read. All over the countries that alexander travelled there are relics in greek. Not bulgarian, not slavic, not "mAcEDoNIAn".
Athenians didnt speak Athenian, Spartans didnt speak Spartan. They spoke greek. Makedones spoke Greek. Greek traditions, Greek religion. Greeks. So.. if some people from Vietnam go to texas in 800 years and settle nowhere near Alamo, can they say that Texans arent americans, and that they are Texans and they speak Texan and that Alamo and its historical figures are part of their culture, not the americans?
Lemme try again, some people from Zambia, go and settle in Castillona Spain, nowhere near Vivar, say Castillians arent spanish but they are and El Cid is their hero and their Culture. I am tired of these people calling themselves "maCeDonIAns". They are appropriating my culture. Makedones were Greeks. It was a Greek kingdom like sparta and many others that may not be well known.
Today they go by "North Macedonia" whilst more than half their population is Albanian. For political reasons to prevent countries like Bulgaria and Albania from developing, these people were given all the diplomatic supporr to create conflict in the balkans and at the expense of my countries history. Next time someone says "I am mAcEDoNiAn" ask them, why are speaking Boulgarian and why did Alexander spread Greek (like every empire does).
I had to share this with you. Times are changing all over the world. The lies are exposed left and right.
Macedonian not Greek.
Greetings from Belgrade and shout out to my Orthodox brothers! Macedonia is Greece!
Tl;dr
Who cares
Makedonia is not Greece. Unlike Greece Makedon is a distinct nation with a national identity that has been distinct from the Hellenes since well before the time of Alexander. Many Hellenes during the time of both Phillip II and Alexander III considered Makedones to be civilized, yet drunken, but by no means Hellenic. Makedonian script and language is not congruent with Classical Greek, and (like the culture and people) exists distinctly so and is not a Hellenic subset that neither Alexander nor Aristotle would recognize. The biggest difference is also that "Greece" as a nation doesn't really exist until the 1800s, whereas Makedon had been a kingdom for centuries before Alexander III and has managed to preserve a national identity until the fall of the Romans in 1453, only to be reborn (with a different ethnic admixture) after the Second World War. Makedon is more real of a nation than Greece is. Alexander was no Hellene
I want to see Todd's workshop do some testing with this armor against longbows. It would be interesting to see the comparison in the different cultural technologies.
Having written about floods I would suggest he investigate Randall Carlson's theory of the Younger Dryas impact and the resulting floods in north America
Love the channel God bless brother
It's essentially the same concept as carbon fiber... it's not all that crazy...
Who said it was crazy? They glued pieces of cloth together
its just neat that these dudes would run up with linen armor and fuck up dudes in chain link
Great info, now im watch the full episode
My mother-in-law had Alexander the great ring
🙄
Did she pick up the phone?
Thank you this is a great piece of research, recreation of ancient technology gives deep insight and understanding on how ancient people lived and thought and the limitations they were subject to
A silk layer would be even more effective
I agree, however silk was highly expensive. A luxury commodity a poor Greek farmer would not have access to. It would not be until the end of 19th century someone would make a protective vest (essentially a gambeson) out of silk as protection against bullets.
I honestly don't if ancient China, with it's historical abundance of silk, ever dabbled in armor made purely of silk. A part of me says they probably did.
nope. Not at all. Silk is pretty useless.
@adifferentangle7064 actually used in Japanese armour, silk has a limited speed response.
A Silk layer is useless, there is no period account of it being worn as armor. You need more than 10 layers for that. No, mongols didnt wear "silk shirts that wrapped around the arrows", that's a myth, It's been tested, it doesn’t work, and having fabric in a wound is bad.
Very interesting, thanks 👍👍👍
Men will literally recreate an extinct form of ancient armor rather than go to therapy.
Only the gullible and the weak-minded go to therapy.
Just so you are aware the father of modern Psychotherapy was a man who killed women with cocaine simply trying to work out their menstrual cycles as well as perfecting his craft by trying to convince children they had not in fact been abused and raped by the rich elite pedophiles within Austrian Society. You probably refer to him as Sigmund freud. The man whose nephew became the father of modern propaganda in America. Therapy is for the weak minded and the gullible and naive.
😂 probably a lot cheaper than therapy
I counted every blade of grass in my front yard before going to couples therapy.
That ISN'T therapy???
AS a general area of historical research, the whole landscape of materials technology is a hot topic. We don't know many things about the past, trying to recreate them helps us understand, and appreciate , the level of skill for any given historic period. This is particularly true the further back in time we go.
The glue used by the ancient Greeks was a mixture of fir or pine resin and beeswax.
Ancient Macedonians not Greeks😂
@@mikele9878 get lost troll
@@mikele9878yes they were Greeks!
MACEDONIANS ARE MACEDONIANS. 25 CENTURIES ! !
Damn great video, have not seen anything as interesting as this on TH-cam in a long time.
That one day Augustus didn't wear his linothorax.
- Never caught your channel before , reallyt enjoyed this.
subscribed.
Greek Warriors had family armor so they’d pass it down to the next generation… if you have great body armor you survive the battle. Not sure they’d write it down so we could learn about it reading books like school girls a couple thousand years later.
yes, but it survives and can be dug up so you'd have the literal armor to analyze
Only school girls read books?
@@AlexanderMoen- actually it doesn’t because it was made of linen and glue. That’s the entire point in this one. If the armor did survive then it could be studied but the warriors didn’t make it for that reason.
@@highlandoutsider- sorry to offend you.
@@riddell74 Don't worry you didn't, I have issues understanding context at times and was genuinely trying to clarify your meaning as it seemed at odds with professing knowledge of ancient Greece as that surely requires the reading of books? 🤷👍
Good job Lex, keep the good stuff coming.
❤️ 🇬🇷
Macedonian
@@ladev91 yes Greek 🇬🇷 not a Bulgarian pretending to be an Ancient Greek 😝
Slavs came to Balkans in 6th century AD@davidscwimer1974
@@davidscwimer1974 bulgarians were thracian, although many bulgarians are probably decendants from greeks and macedonian s as they lived very close
@@georgyzhukov6409 todays fyromians are Bulgaria and and Albanians mostly not ancient Macedonian
Now THAT was fascinating......thank you