Reconstructing Ancient Linen Body Armor - New Book

[Dan Howard]

Look at the title to this thread. In that instance, "linen" is used as an adjective--telling us "what kind of" armor, but it can also be used as a noun [for example, "Linen is a type of cloth or fiber produced from the flax plant."]. I guess it's the same thing as the argument made about the same word root in Greek, isn't it? Greek has the advantage of word endings which give us the clue about which way a word is being used.

Linon is Greek for "flax", which is derived from the Linear B, LINARI - also meaning "flax".
Strabo uses the plural of linothorax, which is a compound noun meaning "linen armour"
Homer uses linothorex, which is an adjective (masc, nom, sing) describing someone who is "armoured in linen"

Edit: corrected "linos" to "linon"