[Spenser T.]

After an hour or so of google searching, I can't seem to find anything concrete on the size of the pre-roman Spanish 'gladius'. What i've found suggests that these swords were longer than the later roman gladius, but i'm not too sure...
Thankfully, there's myArmoury.

[Hector A.]

[ Linked Image ]

Pompeii: 45-55 cm
Mainz/Fulham: 50-55cm
Hispaniensis: 55-65cm

[Matthew Amt]

Oh, that chart is awful---wait a sec, I drew that! Probably all right, then... (Hee hee hee...)

My own hispaniensis is based on one of those from Smihel, and it has a 27 inch blade. I think it's about the longest one known so far. And of course at that length there are people arguing that it's not even a Roman sword but a Gallic one, yada yada...

There is good information in Volume 8 of the Journal of Roman Military Equipment Studies,

http://www.jrmes.org.uk/vol08.htm

I *thought* that at least one of the articles was available online, but some searching by article title may turn it up.

There is also a mongo book by a fellow named Miks which shows a huge number of surviving blades and parts, but he's one of those who doesn't believe that what most of us call a hispaniensis is really that, so I'm not sure how much help it will be. (I don't own the book, unfortunately.)

Matthew

[Chris Goshey]

Found it here: http://www.ffil.uam.es/equus/warmas/online/Qu...C%20rd.pdf

From what I can see it seems like they averaged 32 to 40 centimeters in blade length but there was a large amount of variance in the length.

[Matthew Amt]

Aha! That's the one. Thanks, Chris! I knew I'd seen it out there somewhere.

Matthew