12-06-2006, 05:39 PM
Aitor is correct. Most documents found in Egypt refer to the Roman army using wool as their main source of material for tunics. Egypt was also supplying other parts of the Empire with clothing. Sadly we do not have comparable evidence from the Western Provinces.
Nevertheless at a later date, even in places like Britain what little evidence we have such as mosaics suggests the tunics appear to have the same types of decoration found on actual examples of tunic finds from Egypt, usually labeled as Coptic. This is in fact a very misleading term and generally means most non specialists ignore studying them. Some academics prefer late antique because the alternative term Byzantine is equally misleading. Why they can not say Late Roman is beyond me, it would make things far simpler.
As to the first century remember that Egypt had been conquered by Alexander the Great and was subsequently ruled by the Ptolemies before the Romans arrived. According to Sekunda There appears to have been some attempt to Romanise many successor state armies including those in Egypt. This is why one of the most famous pieces of evidence for Roman Army tunic colours the Palestrina mosaic can also be seen as evidence of Ptolemaic army colours. So do not expect the Egyptian army at that date to look like they have stepped straight out of the Ten Commandments!
Perhaps as a reaction to countless pictures of the Ermine Street Guard over the last thirty years, there is a now a tendency to say that the Roman army was not uniform. However this is still at odds with archaeological finds especially from the third century where if you swapped some of the finds found South Wales with Syria no one would be any wiser.
What we do have of course from Egypt are the amazing funeral portraits and experts now recognize some of these as being of ordinary soldiers not Royal rulers as previously thought. Some of them have sword baldrics worn over the left or their right shoulders which suggest either legionary or centurion ranks. There is a document from Egypt which records how a soldier ordered one of these portraits when he joined the army to send back to his family which shows that ordinary soldiers could afford them. Presumably soldiers in other eastern provinces had their portraits painted as well as the style is more Hellenistic rather than traditional Egyptian but we only have the evidence from Egypt.
Most paintings show soldiers in white tunics with red or black clavi. The cloaks are in a variety of colours including yellow brown, red, blue and possibly dark olive green. This ties in quite well with the evidence for colours that we have from elsewhere throughout the empire at all periods.
Susanna, recent research on the Thorsberg tunic concluded it was dyed bright red and the cloak was bright blue and white. I would not say these were dark colours.
Sources:
N.Sekunda. The Ptolemaic army. Montvert 1995
R.Alston. Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt. 1995
Sumner. Roman Military Clothing 1&2. 2002-3
E. Doxiadis. The Mysterious Fayum Portraits. 1995
N Lewis. Life in Egypt under Roman Rule. 1983
Graham.
Nevertheless at a later date, even in places like Britain what little evidence we have such as mosaics suggests the tunics appear to have the same types of decoration found on actual examples of tunic finds from Egypt, usually labeled as Coptic. This is in fact a very misleading term and generally means most non specialists ignore studying them. Some academics prefer late antique because the alternative term Byzantine is equally misleading. Why they can not say Late Roman is beyond me, it would make things far simpler.
As to the first century remember that Egypt had been conquered by Alexander the Great and was subsequently ruled by the Ptolemies before the Romans arrived. According to Sekunda There appears to have been some attempt to Romanise many successor state armies including those in Egypt. This is why one of the most famous pieces of evidence for Roman Army tunic colours the Palestrina mosaic can also be seen as evidence of Ptolemaic army colours. So do not expect the Egyptian army at that date to look like they have stepped straight out of the Ten Commandments!
Perhaps as a reaction to countless pictures of the Ermine Street Guard over the last thirty years, there is a now a tendency to say that the Roman army was not uniform. However this is still at odds with archaeological finds especially from the third century where if you swapped some of the finds found South Wales with Syria no one would be any wiser.
What we do have of course from Egypt are the amazing funeral portraits and experts now recognize some of these as being of ordinary soldiers not Royal rulers as previously thought. Some of them have sword baldrics worn over the left or their right shoulders which suggest either legionary or centurion ranks. There is a document from Egypt which records how a soldier ordered one of these portraits when he joined the army to send back to his family which shows that ordinary soldiers could afford them. Presumably soldiers in other eastern provinces had their portraits painted as well as the style is more Hellenistic rather than traditional Egyptian but we only have the evidence from Egypt.
Most paintings show soldiers in white tunics with red or black clavi. The cloaks are in a variety of colours including yellow brown, red, blue and possibly dark olive green. This ties in quite well with the evidence for colours that we have from elsewhere throughout the empire at all periods.
Susanna, recent research on the Thorsberg tunic concluded it was dyed bright red and the cloak was bright blue and white. I would not say these were dark colours.
Sources:
N.Sekunda. The Ptolemaic army. Montvert 1995
R.Alston. Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt. 1995
Sumner. Roman Military Clothing 1&2. 2002-3
E. Doxiadis. The Mysterious Fayum Portraits. 1995
N Lewis. Life in Egypt under Roman Rule. 1983
Graham.
"Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream" Edgar Allan Poe.
"Every brush-stroke is torn from my body" The Rebel, Tony Hancock.
"..I sweated in that damn dirty armor....TWENTY YEARS!', Charlton Heston, The Warlord.
"Every brush-stroke is torn from my body" The Rebel, Tony Hancock.
"..I sweated in that damn dirty armor....TWENTY YEARS!', Charlton Heston, The Warlord.
