This article is also available as a YouTube video at the link here.

It is unclear exactly when the site was first colonised, but evidence suggests it was first settled in 44BC by Lucius Munatius Plancus and fully colonised in 15BC under the reign of Augustus following the turmoil of the civil war that was a result of Julius Caesar’s death. Getting closer to our period of interest, by the turn of the 3^rd Century AD Augusta Raurica had grown into a wealthy trading settlement, numbering approximately 20,000 people, exporting various products (but predominantly smoked meat) to the rest of the empire. The city possessed the usual amenities we could expect of a Roman settlement, particularly an amphitheatre and a forum as well as temples, baths, and a theatre with up to 10,000 seats. In AD250 the town was heavily damaged by a large earthquake, and around a decade later the remainder was brought down by roving Germanic tribes. The site was eventually rebuilt in approximately AD300 as Castrum Rauracense, a military fort established close by the old settlement of Augusta Raurica and in the modern day becoming the settlement of Kaiseraugst. The walls of this new fortification are still partially intact, and it is a site of some historical significance as it guarded a river crossing over the Danube and into Roman Gaul and was a meeting point for some of the forces for both Constantius II and Julian during their wars on the Alemanni tribe.

As for our helmet, it was found in 1967 in the settlement of Augusta Raurica, in the ruins of a block of flats. In the same context was a series of pottery fragments dated to the first half of the third century, however as Simon James points out this was all together in a shallow waste deposit which can only give us an earliest possible time of deposition. This is therefore no reason to associate the helmet specifically with that date instead of the fourth century military installation on the same site. Instead, the helmet is more likely to belong to the mid-4^th Century; a classification corroborated by similar finds of the same type across the empire. 

As we can see from the images, the helmet is formed of a two-part iron bowl adjoined by a central ridge and includes two cheek-flaps and a neck-guard, also made of iron. Around the rim of the bowl, the cheek flaps and neck guard, we see holes indicating the presence of an interior leather lining. The central ridge is rather even, with a flat flange either side of a straight central comb, held in by even and parallel rivets. Both the bowl and cheek flaps include a cutout for the ear holes, a feature seen on other helmets of a similar type. The cheeks and neck are attached by a series of rivets.The lack of a browband and general outline of this helmet identifies it as an Intercisa-type, similar to the Worms helmet from last week. 

In similar fashion to the helmets found in the original Intercisa hoard, this helmet was not discovered along with a precious metal overlay although, as Miks notes, there is evidence of forcible dismantling which could well indicate theft of a silver/gilt sheeting that once coated the surface (along with the beautiful repousse decorations we have come to expect).

We can also see from the pictures of the restored helmet that the central ridge includes a series of slots along the spine; whilst these are only visible from the rear view, Miks notes that this is an error of the restoration and a third slot should be present at the front. These slots are present to make the attachment of a crest possible; if we look back at our article and video on the Nijmegen/Noviomagus helmet crest, this is a feature we should expect from the metal fish-fin types (also seen on the Intercisa IV) although the Augst helmet uses slots to attach the crest to the ridge rather than the tabs and rivets of the Nijmegen/Noviomagus example. 

Whether this implies the Augst example used a different type of crest, such as a wooden crest box with horsehair or feathers in, will perhaps remain a mystery. It is equally likely it was decorated with either a fish-fin or something more colourful, and in this case our favourite secondary source (the artwork) is of little help as open-face helmets are depicted with both colourful crests and fish-fin crests. The supplementary archaeology does, as discussed in the Nijmegen article, perhaps suggest a fishfin was more likely due to the surprising number of Chi-Rho plates found in the archaeological record, but we cannot be certain. 

As to why the crest would need to be removable, we can make an educated guess that the purpose is either storage and transportation, as a detached crest can be stored more easily and safely than a permanently affixed one, or perhaps for ceremonial occasions such as processions and religious events, or even a pay parade. This is simple guess-work of course, as we mentioned in the Nijmegen article, as there is no way to confirm exactly when, where, and why crests were worn or distributed. 

We can perhaps guess therefore that this helmet was worn and used by a regular legionary of some kind, with the option to add a crest to denote either a special occasion or a promotion to a more senior rank. This could be another good example therefore of the mass production capability of the late Roman army; a series of helmets created en-masse with the possibility to add or remove adornments as the occasion, or bearer, warranted.  

If we assume the surface was coated with either no precious material or in simple tinning, and the ridge was adorned with a fishfin crest, it may well have looked like the reconstruction by the Pustelak Brothers’ Art Workshop we can see below. Alternatively, had the helmet been decorated with a more expensive gilded sheeting with the necessary repousse work, it may instead have looked like the Intercisa-IV reconstruction by the same workshop we have seen so many times before. As the images show, either example is a beautiful piece of equipment any legionary would likely have been proud to wear into battle, or while defending his fortress along the Danube. 

Images courtesy of the Pustelak Brothers Art Workshop and Christian Miks.