Emesa helmet

The Emesa helmet (also known as the Homs helmet) is a Roman cavalry sports helmet from the early first century AD.

Description
The helmet is made of iron and consists of two parts: a head piece and a face mask. The top of the head piece, now rusted, shows remains of a woven and likely colourful fabric. Around the sides runs a diadem in the image of a laurel wreath, while a narrow fluted strip runs from front to back. This strip terminates in the neck guard, which is covered with an acanthus scroll surrounded by birds and butterflies. This ornamentation is covered in silver gilt, as is the face mask, which hangs from the head piece by a central hinge. A loop under each ear, and holes in the neck guard, would allow its wearer to fasten it closed. The face mask has additional holes in the mouth, nostrils, and eyes; three holes underneath each eye-slit allow for a greater range of vision. The helmet weights 2.217 kg, and is dated by its ornament, and by other objects found in the tomb, to the early first century AD.

The face mask of the Emesa helmet shows distinctive features. The nose is long and fleshy with a prominent bump, and extends high between the eyes. The cheekbones are low yet prominent, and the small mouth, which droops toward the sinister side, shows a thick lower lip. Other features, meanwhile—the eyes and eyebrows, and the chin—are more conventional. These features suggest that the maker of the Emesa helmet attempted to translate some of the individual characteristics of the wearer's face into the helmet.

Discovery
The helmet was discovered by looters in the summer of 1936, in the modern-day city of Homs. Digging near the former site of a monument to Sampsigeramus, they found a complex of rich tombs and extricated the objects. Their discovery was due to the garment shroud of one of the bodies, covered with small golden plaques that shed into the earth when disturbed. The next morning children noticed this gold and brought it to a bazaar, where it came to the attention of the police and ultimately led to the arrest of the looters and the confiscation of the grave objects. It was then secured for the state collection by Emir Djaafar Abdel Kader, the curator of the National Museum of Damascus at the time.

The helmet required conservation work when found, and after several unsuccessful attempts it was brought to the British Museum. There it was restored by Herbert Maryon, who in 1946 had reconstructed the Anglo-Saxon Sutton Hoo helmet. It is now in the collection of the National Museum of Damascus. From 1999 to 2002 it was part of a travelling exhibition, Syria: Land of Civilizations, with stops in Switzerland, Canada, and the United States.