05-14-2007, 08:30 AM
Perhaps we're making a mistake, trying to decide whether armour was leather or linen, on the basis of so little evidence. Do we have to make a decision, or can we just agree that we don't know?
- Ah, I begin to see the problem with my own suggestion; it would allow people to re-construct the armours in all the different ways that upset all the different parties.
Magnus thinks leather musculata are just ridiculous; I'm inclined to see leather segmentata much more in that light (not terribly relevant to us Greeks) while thinking that leather would lend itself quite well to being moulded into an image of the perfect male physique. While leather ( and here I'm including, possibly, hide/rawhide) may not be as effective as padded, layered or quilted linen for stopping arrows, it does, nonetheless have very good defensive qualities, especially in "turning" pointed and edged blades, and even more so if it has been boiled during the moulding process.
While Ruben argues that dyeing or painting leather would have been hard to do and rather temporary, I know that it was all the rage in later eras, when no item of leather kit would be left unpainted, by any self-respecting battlefield poser, and I believe there is evidence from Ancient Greece for painted leather kit, other than armour. Correct me if I'm wrong. Ancient Greek kit has always struck me as battlefield posing kit par excellence - the main reason for my interest in the period and for my belief that painting of armour, whether metal or of other materials, is highly likely to have taken place.
Is there anybody out there who rejects leather for musculata armour, but would accept it for linothorakes or as part of a composit linothorax?
Or someone who would accept leather segmentata for Romans, while rejecting the musculata? It seems to me there are those who believe at least some musculata may have been of leather. Maybe we should have a poll...
I don't think I know enough to make a decision on this issue, and the longer the thread goes on, the more people seem to say the same, whilst defending their own preferred theory. My real objection to leather is that the reproductions produced in it (or to imitate it!) which I have seen so far, just look so fake.
- Ah, I begin to see the problem with my own suggestion; it would allow people to re-construct the armours in all the different ways that upset all the different parties.
Magnus thinks leather musculata are just ridiculous; I'm inclined to see leather segmentata much more in that light (not terribly relevant to us Greeks) while thinking that leather would lend itself quite well to being moulded into an image of the perfect male physique. While leather ( and here I'm including, possibly, hide/rawhide) may not be as effective as padded, layered or quilted linen for stopping arrows, it does, nonetheless have very good defensive qualities, especially in "turning" pointed and edged blades, and even more so if it has been boiled during the moulding process.
While Ruben argues that dyeing or painting leather would have been hard to do and rather temporary, I know that it was all the rage in later eras, when no item of leather kit would be left unpainted, by any self-respecting battlefield poser, and I believe there is evidence from Ancient Greece for painted leather kit, other than armour. Correct me if I'm wrong. Ancient Greek kit has always struck me as battlefield posing kit par excellence - the main reason for my interest in the period and for my belief that painting of armour, whether metal or of other materials, is highly likely to have taken place.
Is there anybody out there who rejects leather for musculata armour, but would accept it for linothorakes or as part of a composit linothorax?
Or someone who would accept leather segmentata for Romans, while rejecting the musculata? It seems to me there are those who believe at least some musculata may have been of leather. Maybe we should have a poll...
I don't think I know enough to make a decision on this issue, and the longer the thread goes on, the more people seem to say the same, whilst defending their own preferred theory. My real objection to leather is that the reproductions produced in it (or to imitate it!) which I have seen so far, just look so fake.
