The backbone of the Roman army was the infantry, armed with a javelin, or pilum, and sword, or gladius. This study investigates not just the weapon itself, and its design and manufacture, but how the sword was originally conceived and how it was employed on the battlefield as an expression of the Roman state. The authors start examining the early swords employed across the Italian Peninsula during the Bronze Age and how these evolved into the gladius, which itself changed in the period of ...