Linothorax vs Quilted linen vs spolas

[MeinPanzer]

Another piece to throw on the fire:

I've been digging through Delian inventories lately, and I came upon this entry:

A cavalry thyreos in an oblong [shape?]- (em plaisiwi peri- and then lacuna)... a perfect gilded helmet with gilded horns and cheek pieces- (lacuna)... [something] silvered. Cuirass of woven linen with golden disks (thoraka huphanton linoun echonta chrusas aspidiskas)

Of course, this could very well be a cuirass captured from a barbarian, but the context of the other arms mentioned doesn't seem to indicate this. Foreign arms often seem to be qualified as such, and the horned helmet, for instance, is a very Hellenistic emblem of kingship - helmets with horns are shown, of course, on Seleucid coins. Still nice to have another source to work with.

[rocktupac]

Another piece to throw on the fire:

I've been digging through Delian inventories lately, and I came upon this entry:

A cavalry thyreos in an oblong [shape?]- (em plaisiwi peri- and then lacuna)... a perfect gilded helmet with gilded horns and cheek pieces- (lacuna)... [something] silvered. Cuirass of woven linen with golden disks (thoraka huphanton linoun echonta chrusas aspidiskas)

Of course, this could very well be a cuirass captured from a barbarian, but the context of the other arms mentioned doesn't seem to indicate this. Foreign arms often seem to be qualified as such, and the horned helmet, for instance, is a very Hellenistic emblem of kingship - helmets with horns are shown, of course, on Seleucid coins. Still nice to have another source to work with.

Very interesting find! Add another reference to the growing pile!

[MeinPanzer]

And the plot thickens... Here's an entry amalgamated from a number of inventory lists from the same building:

...Wooden shields, 7; piloi stuppinoi (still have to look up what stuppinos means), 7; daggers (lacuna); machaira, 1; leather cuirasses (thorakia), 4;

So, clearly leather cuirasses were in use in or before the mid-4th c. BC, but what follows this is unfortunately fragmentary, but tantalizing. One version of this inventory list, in a new entry after "thorakia skutina, IIII," reads "linou(n)" (linen), and another version, in which the portion with "linoun" is missing, reads "spoladion" right after where that word should be. It seems very likely that this read something like "linoun hen spoladion," or "one linen spoladion"... which would mean that the spolas (spoladion is the diminutive version of spolas) could be either leather or linen!

[Paullus Scipio]

Another piece to throw on the fire:

I've been digging through Delian inventories lately, and I came upon this entry:

A cavalry thyreos in an oblong [shape?]- (em plaisiwi peri- and then lacuna)... a perfect gilded helmet with gilded horns and cheek pieces- (lacuna)... [something] silvered. Cuirass of woven linen with golden disks (thoraka huphanton linoun echonta chrusas aspidiskas)

Of course, this could very well be a cuirass captured from a barbarian, but the context of the other arms mentioned doesn't seem to indicate this. Foreign arms often seem to be qualified as such, and the horned helmet, for instance, is a very Hellenistic emblem of kingship - helmets with horns are shown, of course, on Seleucid coins. Still nice to have another source to work with.

Just to sound a note of caution here.....helmets with horns were not necessarily restricted to "Kings", - they were fairly widespread in Italy, or among the celts, for instance.Nor can I think of any Hellenistic King who might have been in Delos around this time. Furthermore, the date is troublesome (165-157 BC ). This would be a late date for both these items being 'contemporary'. I'm curious as to where this inscription comes from....would it be a temple by any chance? If so, that greatly increases the possibility that this is a list of 'trophies' owned by the temple, like the linen cuirasses seen by Pausanias in a temple in Asia Minor in the 1 C AD.......

[Paullus Scipio]

Ruben wrote:

One version of this inventory list, in a new entry after "thorakia skutina, IIII," reads "linou(n)" (linen), and another version, in which the portion with "linoun" is missing, reads "spoladion" right after where that word should be. It seems very likely that this read something like "linoun hen spoladion," or "one linen spoladion"... which would mean that the spolas (spoladion is the diminutive version of spolas) could be either leather or linen!

Another note of caution... :wink: When you say 'one version' and 'another version', do you mean the actual inscription is duplicated, or do you mean different attempts at translation of a worn and fragmentary inscription ? Again, some more information please. Is this a temple inscription?

Also, while we know that spolas/stole could be used with 'organic' armour other than leather ( see the felt armour example , probably a horse trapper, referred to above), could it be that in fact there is a lacuna or just a letter or two, which one translator/interpreter has left as a gap and in the other version, another interpreter, "knowing" that body armour/spolades was linen ( per Connolly), has 'restored'/emended/guessed the entry ? This would not be the first time a 'finder/archaeologist' has got it wrong....for example the measurements for certain examples of Greek/Macedonian feet were incorrectly measured by the excavator, which has ramifications for the "Length of the Macedonian sarissa" debate elsewhere ( I really must get around to posting this and other relevant matters on that thread ! )

Again, this is tantalising ! More information, please, Ruben !!

[MeinPanzer]

Sorry, I think I should have been clearer when introducing these...

Just to sound a note of caution here.....helmets with horns were not necessarily restricted to "Kings", - they were fairly widespread in Italy, or among the celts, for instance.Nor can I think of any Hellenistic King who might have been in Delos around this time. Furthermore, the date is troublesome (165-157 BC ). This would be a late date for both these items being 'contemporary'. I'm curious as to where this inscription comes from....would it be a temple by any chance? If so, that greatly increases the possibility that this is a list of 'trophies' owned by the temple, like the linen cuirasses seen by Pausanias in a temple in Asia Minor in the 1 C AD.......

Yes, these are all temple or treasury inventories. Such inventories are found only in Athens and on Delos (owing to its Athenian connections). The whole study of these lists is very complicated and fraught with difficulty, but I am trying my hand at working through them because they are a treasure trove ( :wink: ) of information, owing to the fact that they are often securely dated and usually include fairly detailed entries. I know that this is still a temple dedication, and so the objects themselves cannot be solidly dated, but they are grouped together in like groups, and the other items mentioned alongside it include a thyreos, and so they are very likely Hellenistic. Besides this, in these entries arms and armour are usually qualified with ethnic terms (Illyrian and Achaean helmets and Celtic swords are mentioned, just to name a few examples), and so a lack of an ethnic term very likely means that these were simply considered "Greek" arms. Because of this, I would lean towards these items being Greek, and not foreign, though it's definitely not certain.

Another note of caution... :wink: When you say 'one version' and 'another version', do you mean the actual inscription is duplicated, or do you mean different attempts at translation of a worn and fragmentary inscription ? Again, some more information please. Is this a temple inscription?

These are actual different versions. The way it worked was that the inventory was made and inscribed, and then at regular intervals new items were added to the list and it was then re-inscribed. The problem is that for the Delian lists of the best-represented period (314-166 BC), the new items are added into the inventory at random, meaning that it's left to the epigrapher to try and figure out what's new and what's not! However, this does mean that lacunae can be emended with certainty in a lot of cases.

Also, while we know that spolas/stole could be used with 'organic' armour other than leather ( see the felt armour example , probably a horse trapper, referred to above), could it be that in fact there is a lacuna or just a letter or two, which one translator/interpreter has left as a gap and in the other version, another interpreter, "knowing" that body armour/spolades was linen ( per Connolly), has 'restored'/emended/guessed the entry ? This would not be the first time a 'finder/archaeologist' has got it wrong....for example the measurements for certain examples of Greek/Macedonian feet were incorrectly measured by the excavator, which has ramifications for the "Length of the Macedonian sarissa" debate elsewhere ( I really must get around to posting this and other relevant matters on that thread ! )

Again, this is tantalising ! More information, please, Ruben !!

The people who deal with this kind of stuff aren't usually involved in other areas of archaeology (otherwise they would have to be experts on just about every aspect of Greek material culture), but are just concerned with ordering the lists and making sense of the system and its implications for temple dedications, so the influence of someone like Connolly wouldn't really play into it.

Here's the raw info - bracketed portions are missing, "-" indicates the end of a line, and · indicates the end of a category:

ID 104(26)
...??????? ?????? :???: ????? ????????? :???: ?????????? :....: ??????? :?: ???]-
????? ??????? :????: ??????[? :?: ?????????. ???????...

ID 104(28)
...???[????] ?????? v ??? v ????? [????????? v ??? v ?????????? — — — — — — ?????]-
[??· ??????? ??????? v ???? v ?????? ??? ???]??????[?]· ???????...

ID 104(29)
[...??????? ?????? :???: ????? ??????]??? :???: ???[?]?-
[?????: — — ]: ??????? [:?:? ??????? ??????? :????: ?????? ???] ?????????· ?[??]???-...

As you can see, they are all pretty much the same but with minor differences. After spoladion the category (which is clearly arms and armour) ends, and the next entry (pedalia - a rudder) begins. If we were to make a synthesis from this of what we know for certain, it would look like this:

...??????[? — — — ] ?????????·

Now 104(26) shows an emendation in which linoun has been taken to have a number after it, marking it as a separate entry - that is, simply a linen object. However, this doesn't fit into the list (which would then end with the spoladion and move on). Therefore, it seems likely that this refers to a linen spoladion with a written number, as this is the last entry in the category, such as ??, one, and this is what is added in ID 104(28) above.

[PMBardunias]

Ruben, great find! This dovetails nicely with Aeneas Tacticus 29.1-4 which you posted a while back if we assume "stolidia" reads "leather armor":

...accomplices there were brought in linen corslets [thorakes lineoi], cloaks [stolidia]...

The concurrent use of both leather and linen is a nice place for this debate to end up. I do wonder if Stolidia/Spolidia and Thorakes describe modes of construction rather than material. Perhaps Spolidia is synonymous with a Tube and Yoke, for it hangs like an apron or the skin of an animal (a la Heracles as Christian noted) and is "short" for a garment, while Thorakes is more general and broad sensed or may imply a vest cut?

Note that the Pilos were textile:

????????? , to/,
A. the coarse fibre of flax or hemp, tow, oakum, Hdt. 8.52, X.Cyr.7.5.23, D.47.20, Aen.Tact.33,35, Plb.1.45.12, 5.89.2, D.S.14.51, Plu.Cic.18, Gal.16.622, App.Hann.33, Ill.11, Luc.Asin. 31. (In Papyri and codd. written also ????????, ????????? (qq. v.), ????????, ???????, ???????? (cf. ????????: ?? ?????, Hsch.); ???????? is confirmed by IG22.1631.336, ????????? by PCair.Zen. 177.6, 514.7 (iii B.C.), and by ??????????????, ????????????? (qq.v.); cf. [????]???? IG22.1629.1150.)
0-0. [????]????-?????? , o(,= sq., IG22.1673.15,41.

[MeinPanzer]

Ruben, great find! This dovetails nicely with Aeneas Tacticus 29.1-4 which you posted a while back if we assume "stolidia" reads "leather armor":

The concurrent use of both leather and linen is a nice place for this debate to end up.

I agree. Though I know Paul disagrees, this evidence plus the Aeneas excerpt makes it quite clear to me that linen and leather cuirasses were used at the same time, at least during the Classical and very likely also during the Hellenistic period.

I do wonder if Stolidia/Spolidia and Thorakes describe modes of construction rather than material. Perhaps Spolidia is synonymous with a Tube and Yoke, for it hangs like an apron or the skin of an animal (a la Heracles as Christian noted) and is "short" for a garment, while Thorakes is more general and broad sensed or may imply a vest cut?

I don't know if we can infer much about the appearance of these different cuirasses from their names - there is actually much to be done in studying the military terminology of such inventory lists, since they seem to use words which we tend to translate more generally very specifically. For instance, kune, perikephalaia, and kranos are all used to refer to helmets within the same or similar lists; since it is evident with other categories of items that they tend to use one term to refer to one kind of item, it seems likely that these were used technically to refer to different classes of helmets.

Note that the Pilos were textile:

????????? , to/,
A. the coarse fibre of flax or hemp, tow, oakum, Hdt. 8.52, X.Cyr.7.5.23, D.47.20, Aen.Tact.33,35, Plb.1.45.12, 5.89.2, D.S.14.51, Plu.Cic.18, Gal.16.622, App.Hann.33, Ill.11, Luc.Asin. 31. (In Papyri and codd. written also ????????, ????????? (qq. v.), ????????, ???????, ???????? (cf. ????????: ?? ?????, Hsch.); ???????? is confirmed by IG22.1631.336, ????????? by PCair.Zen. 177.6, 514.7 (iii B.C.), and by ??????????????, ????????????? (qq.v.); cf. [????]???? IG22.1629.1150.)
0-0. [????]????-?????? , o(,= sq., IG22.1673.15,41.

Good to know, thanks. I figured they were probably caps, but they very well could have been qualified as some sort of helmet.

[Dan Howard]

I agree. Though I know Paul disagrees, this evidence plus the Aeneas excerpt makes it quite clear to me that linen and leather cuirasses were used at the same time, at least during the Classical and very likely also during the Hellenistic period.

Yep. With this new info I think there is enough now to conclude that both were in use at the same time.

[Paullus Scipio]

Paul B. wrote:

The concurrent use of both leather and linen is a nice place for this debate to end up.

Ruben wrote:

I agree. Though I know Paul disagrees, this evidence plus the Aeneas excerpt makes it quite clear to me that linen and leather cuirasses were used at the same time, at least during the Classical and very likely also during the Hellenistic period.

Dan wrote:

Yep. With this new info I think there is enough now to conclude that both were in use at the same time.

What the.....? Where did this come from? I have never said that, or disagreed. The information isn't something 'new'. We already knew that leather 'spolades' and linen 'thorakes lineoi' were in use concurrently in Asia minor ( the Aeneas quote refers to a city in Asia minor).....Xenophon told us so !! That fact was never part of the so-called 'debate' at any time !

I do wonder if Stolidia/Spolidia and Thorakes describe modes of construction rather than material. Perhaps Spolidia is synonymous with a Tube and Yoke, for it hangs like an apron or the skin of an animal (a la Heracles as Christian noted) and is "short" for a garment, while Thorakes is more general and broad sensed or may imply a vest cut?

...Definitely not modes of construction, for while 'spolas/stole' may describe what we call Tube-and-Yoke, 'thorakes' means generally "chest/ body protection", and hence we may describe 'spolades' as a sub-set of 'thorakes'. Also against this idea is the fact that we hear of 'thorakes lineoi' but not 'spolades lineoi' in Xenophon etc ( and he, if anyone, should know his Greek military terminology! ) - unless you want to postulate that linen armour was not Tube-and-Yoke at all, but what you call 'vest-cut', like a bronze muscled cuirass. :wink: :lol:

Ruben wrote:

Yes, these are all temple or treasury inventories. Such inventories are found only in Athens and on Delos (owing to its Athenian connections). The whole study of these lists is very complicated and fraught with difficulty, but I am trying my hand at working through them because they are a treasure trove ( ) of information, owing to the fact that they are often securely dated and usually include fairly detailed entries. I know that this is still a temple dedication, and so the objects themselves cannot be solidly dated, but they are grouped together in like groups, and the other items mentioned alongside it include a thyreos, and so they are very likely Hellenistic. Besides this, in these entries arms and armour are usually qualified with ethnic terms (Illyrian and Achaean helmets and Celtic swords are mentioned, just to name a few examples), and so a lack of an ethnic term very likely means that these were simply considered "Greek" arms. Because of this, I would lean towards these items being Greek, and not foreign, though it's definitely not certain.

Thought they would be Temple/Treasury lists ( temple and treasury were synonymous). I don't agree that because an item appears alongside another, they are necessarily contemporaneous - consider the actual find of what these lists refer to - at Olympia - where helmets for example spanned a period of several hundred years. Nor does lack of an 'ethnic' term imply very much, considering that the lists must have been compiled by a number of individuals over several hundred years, and whereas in the 4C BC, a 'celtic sword' would be a sufficient novelty to be described as such, it might not be the case in the 2 C BC, when celtic mercenaries were common in the Greek/Hellenistic world, and a similar item might be described as 'long sword' or even just 'sword' by a later compiler. Or, to put it another way, what might be considered 'Greek' arms in one century would not be in another - consider as another example the 'Thyreos' with no ethnic tag, while in the 4 C BC it might well have been described as 'celtic thyreos'.

Also, I don't think the idea of 'linous.......spoladion' links in the way Ruben suggests - the lacuna could be anything, and if that hypothesis were to be correct, why does Xenophon never call linen armour 'spolades lineoi', but only ever 'thorakes lineoi' ? It would have to be a first ( the list), because, as far as I can recall, there is no other reference anywhere to a 'linen spolas'. Recall also that Pollux's 'Onomastikon' entry doesn't refer to spolades of 'leather or linen' ( though obviously, 'spolas/stole' could refer to a felt horse trapper (probably) and so wasn't exclusively leather ( though could be just 'animal skin products' - felt would fit this definition.

[PMBardunias]

For instance, kune, perikephalaia, and kranos are all used to refer to helmets within the same or similar lists; since it is evident with other categories of items that they tend to use one term to refer to one kind of item, it seems likely that these were used technically to refer to different classes of helmets.

I agree this is quite important. I have just started combing through the original Greek, and "thorakes" is used in many ways. Sometimes simply as "thorax", implying that the word itself was sufficient to tell the reader that a, presumably bronze, cuirasse was meant. Other times the phrase is longer, as in "for the thorax", using throax as an anatomical reference and not a item of panoply. Getting all the references together and looking for changes in use both temporally and geographically could be very interesting. Determining why a given author used which term is needed.

Also against this idea is the fact that we hear of 'thorakes lineoi' but not 'spolades lineoi' in Xenophon etc ( and he, if anyone, should know his Greek military terminology! )

If spolades meant simply a hanging garment like a blacksmith's apron, then became the slang term for a T-Y based on construction, Xenophon might not care if it was made of linen or leather. Such things are important to poets, but perhaps less so to a man who is interested more in function than form.

- unless you want to postulate that linen armour was not Tube-and-Yoke at all, but what you call 'vest-cut', like a bronze muscled cuirass.

Not all linen armor, but perhaps some and some leather as well. Especially early, there are vest-like non TY armors and they need a name. That is not to say each instance of the word Thorakes coupled with Lineoi implies this, the term thorakes is obviously used both very broadly while also very narrowly to indicate Bronze armor. It is not so clean though, because a Spolades could be a TY, but it was also armor for the Thorax, thus both terms could be applied. This discussion has always centered on material, but I think it may need to shift to form.

[MeinPanzer]

What the.....? Where did this come from? I have never said that, or disagreed. The information isn't something 'new'. We already knew that leather 'spolades' and linen 'thorakes lineoi' were in use concurrently in Asia minor ( the Aeneas quote refers to a city in Asia minor).....Xenophon told us so !! That fact was never part of the so-called 'debate' at any time !

How do we know that the Aeneas quote refers to a city in Asia Minor? I think I must have missed something.

Thought they would be Temple/Treasury lists ( temple and treasury were synonymous).

Somewhat, but in the case of the Delian inventories, it's worth differentiating between the "major treasures," which are found in temples, and the "minor treasures," which are found in the smaller treasury buildings.

I don't agree that because an item appears alongside another, they are necessarily contemporaneous - consider the actual find of what these lists refer to - at Olympia - where helmets for example spanned a period of several hundred years.

True, but in this case these arms don't appear in earlier records.

Nor does lack of an 'ethnic' term imply very much, considering that the lists must have been compiled by a number of individuals over several hundred years, and whereas in the 4C BC, a 'celtic sword' would be a sufficient novelty to be described as such, it might not be the case in the 2 C BC, when celtic mercenaries were common in the Greek/Hellenistic world, and a similar item might be described as 'long sword' or even just 'sword' by a later compiler. Or, to put it another way, what might be considered 'Greek' arms in one century would not be in another - consider as another example the 'Thyreos' with no ethnic tag, while in the 4 C BC it might well have been described as 'celtic thyreos'.

Thankfully, the perpetuation of lists makes it quite clear that once an object was included in the list with an ethnic title, it stuck. To give but one example, an "Illyrian" helmet dedicated on the acropolis at Athens can be tracked through almost a century of storage, and it kept its ethnic designation despite the fact that the added information that it came from Lesbos was lost. The compilers of these inventories were careful to take stock of prior inventories, as ensuring that all dedications in the collections were accounted for was the primary purpose of these inventories.

Also, I don't think the idea of 'linous.......spoladion' links in the way Ruben suggests - the lacuna could be anything,

Hardly. These lists follow a strict and well-understood formula, considering that we have hundreds of them and the more complete examples are hundreds of lines long. It's either a number in Greek numerals, in which case "linous" is a separate entry but the continuity of the list is broken, or a written number or some other qualifier that is only two or three letters long, which would then link the two words together.

and if that hypothesis were to be correct, why does Xenophon never call linen armour 'spolades lineoi', but only ever 'thorakes lineoi' ? It would have to be a first ( the list), because, as far as I can recall, there is no other reference anywhere to a 'linen spolas'. Recall also that Pollux's 'Onomastikon' entry doesn't refer to spolades of 'leather or linen' ( though obviously, 'spolas/stole' could refer to a felt horse trapper (probably) and so wasn't exclusively leather ( though could be just 'animal skin products' - felt would fit this definition.

Perhaps because this was a later invention? Or because the spolas was most commonly made of leather, and so Xenophon never encountered one of these rare examples? There could be any number of reasons why.

[Dan Howard]

I want to thank Ruben. For me at least this issue is settled. I can't see how any additional evidence in the future could do other than strengthen the argument that both leather and linen were in use at the same time. All it might do is give more detail as to how each was constructed and worn, or perhaps tell us which was more common.

[hoplite14gr]

Wierd quilting the linothorax as shown on some pottery.
Sheep wool is used for the pudding.

The results of a 50 lbs crossbow shot from 2.5 meter distance on a 15 lauer unquilted linen.
Absolutely no penetration despite successive shots!

And.....we solved the "stiffened shoulder/pteryges" issue!!!!!!!!!
I will let you drool till we publish the paper :twisted:

Kind regards

[Thunder]

Padded armour does have more of a 'pedigree' in terms of armour usage (being the most common type), whereas laminated armours are not particularly common. The logical theory to me seems that the Hellenes used different materials and different styles of construction in their armour, as the sheer hetrogenity of post-Alexander hellenic culture makes a mockery of any concept of homogenous design.


In fact, the only homogenous armour design I can think of is mail, and that's only in terms of material - it is commonly only forged from wrought iron. Even then, there are different methods of constructing it.