Roman 'superglue' found

Wed 5 Dec 2007

'Caesar's superglue' find

ARCHAEOLOGISTS in Germany have found a 2,000-year-old glue Roman warriors used to repair helmets, shields and the other accessories of battle.

"Caesar's superglue" - as it has been dubbed by workers at the Rhine State Museum in Bonn - was found on a helmet at a site near Xanthen on the Rhine River where Romans settled before Christ.

Frank Welker, a restorer at the museum, said: "We found the parade cavalry helmet had been repaired with an adhesive that was still doing its job.

"This is rightly called some kind of superglue because air, water and time have not diminished its bonding properties. We haven't mixed up a batch ourselves yet, but we can thoroughly reccommend it - it lasts, after all, for 2,000 years."

The adhesive was made from a mixture of bitumen, cattle fat and bark pitch.