[William P]

im just asking this question about the buckler, descibed in the rulebooks of D&D
Buckler
This small metal shield is worn strapped to your forearm. You can use a bow or crossbow without penalty while carrying it. You can also use your shield arm to wield a weapon (whether you are using an off-hand weapon or using your off hand to help wield a two-handed weapon), but you take a -1 penalty on attack rolls while doing so. This penalty stacks with those that may apply for fighting with your off hand and for fighting with two weapons. In any case, if you use a weapon in your off hand, you don’t get the buckler’s AC bonus for the rest of the round.
thats the description

so clearly this is a shield that is strapped to your arm and either doesnt possess, or doesnt neccesarily need you to utilise some sort of handgrip

does this kind of shield have any historical precedence? at all
and i already know of the existance of the more common historical buckler (the small fist shield used in the I:33 manuscript)
i know of the 'buckler' used by sword and buckler men i.e the rotella/ target which is a shield gripped similarly to an aspis.

and the third shield i know that party fits this catagory of allowing one to grip a weapon in the off hand is the scottish targe

anyone know if the D&D buckler is purely made up or is based off one of those or its besed off another kind of shield not commonly used?

my personal thought is that its based off the spanish 'buckler' used by rodeleros. since thats strapped to the arm as well. and is called a buckler in some writings

[Dan Howard]

IIRC some Persian archers could shoot a bow with a small shield strapped to the forearm. It probably shouldn't be called a buckler unless it had a hand grip.

[William P]

whats IIRC mean anyway ive seen it alot.

bt yeah, i said that too when shown the D&D rules for armours, saying 'thats not really a buckler, bcklers are small hields held in the hand, not strapped to the forearm.'

you know now that i think of it, i think its just almost a size catagory..
buckler means really small , round shield. regardless of how its gripped

my wondering is how people got to think of the buckler as a forearm shield whout a boss.

im guessing its because of the spanish rotella

and which arm did the persians attatch the shield to. the arm holding the bow, or the one holding the string?
and by persians i assume were talking ancient persian i.e the ones facing the ancient greeks.

[Dan Howard]

[Matthew Amt]

I've seen such a thing in a little Osprey-like booklet on the Battle of Flodden, 1513, but it was called a target. Made of wood and strapped to the forearm, used by pikemen. But I'm not sure how solidly documented that is. Great little book, overall, I just don't know the period in enough detail to say how far it can be trusted.

Matthew

[William P]

[Matthew Amt]

According to the book, as I recall, it was simple wood planks and made to be strapped to the arm, without an actual grip.

Matthew

[Matthew Bunker]

Some useful information in this old thread:-
http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=23240

[Lafayette C Curtis]

[William P]

an update on arm strapped shields

a find known as the Iron Shield of Bititsy., it was used by the khazars of the ukranian steppes

http://archaeology.kiev.ua/journal/020300/komar_sukhobokov.htm heres the page mentioning it.. although you will need google translate to read it so heres what the relelvent part says (i google translated the page myself earlier but the translation is abit strange so, bear with me

There are no reliable and archaeological data on billboards ( i think that refers to shields), as the material of which they were made - wood and leather - is not preserved. In the nomadic Khazars apparently used an ordinary Turk shield, which gives an idea of finding in a mound of V Aymyrlyg 3 in Tuva. The shield is round, diameter 78 cm is made of five plates, each a width of 15-18 cm and a thickness of not more than 1 cm in the inside of the wooden planks joined the crossbar. Such a panel could not withstand the impact slashing weapons. According B.B.Ovchinnikovoy, this indicates that the Turks did not use a shield in close combat, and used it only for protection against strel24. In the bone artifacts from Sarkel we actually see the soldiers without shields in their hands, but in it there are circular images that can be interpreted as abandoned on the ground shields (Fig. 4, 7). It is likely, given that the affected warrior with a spear thrown to the ground onions, and the blow let go of the sword.

[Lafayette C Curtis]

That's odd, because as far as I know small shields of that size from the Steppes were fist-gripped bucklers.