I'm building a reproduction lorica hamata as part of a 1st century BC legionary panoply. From what I've read wire production from drawing alone is not confirmed this early and in any case the perfect modern steel wire I've been using bothers me. I have seen period links with squarish cross-sections and heard a museum curator suggest the wire was cut from sheets, and perhaps drawn through a primitive draw plate to knock off the corners. How might I make these links look more accurate?
Here is a photo of how I have been doing it, and my first link from handmade wire:
One technique is called block twisting.
The metal was beaten into a flat disk as thick as the desired wire diameter. With shears, a continuous coil was cut from the edge with a square cross section.
This coil was stretched to straighten it and tightly twisted along its axis.
The peppermint stick twist produces a wire that is more round than square. The ridges could be removed by planishing or by rolling between plates.
This paper is about gold wire, but even today the techniques used for ferrous and nonferrous wire have little difference.