The Roman military is an iconic, ancient institution; everybody is familiar with the image of fearsome Roman centurions marching in their famous columns. In this book, Roman military experts John and Hilary Travis turn their attention to the shields used by the historic Roman stalwarts, drawing on their expertise, their wealth of illustrated material and the world of re-enactments. In its study of the panoply of shields used by the Romans, Roman Shields differs from those preceding in that it has drawn together the streams of published information of sculptural imagery and archaeological 'hard' evidence, while also looking at the component parts, how they are physically put together, and attempting to reproduce the aspects of the artefacts observed through reconstructing them and subjecting them to regular use and combat conditions.