Military Tunic - Stitching and weave help

[Tim Edwards]

Graham Sumner has produced an excellent and in my opinion near exhaustive, and objective study of colour, but I do not feel has really thrashed out weaves and stitching. Given that I am about to do another winter march on the German limes, I need more clothing that is warm, practical and accurate. Colour is less of an issue!!

I am spending time over the winter to replace my wardrobe with 100% hand woven, dyed and sewn tunics and cloaks, but I want to make sure I get it right. I have a bundle of Afghan and Polish hand woven linen and wool, together with a small pile of natural dyes and mordants all ready to go, but I don't want to waste these costly materials.

So far I have only looked at remains from the Northern Provinces, using works by Hald, Schlabow and Wild.

I accept that most tunics would have been purpose woven on looms, and would thus have a complete circuit of starting/finishing borders and selvedges, which I will be copying at home, but how are seams stitched together?

Given that pretty much all roman reenactors will have tunics as part of their equipment (I find you look a bit strange without one!), what weaves do others use, and what stitching?

Does anyone have any authentic tablet weaving patterns that I can use for borders?

[Cheyenne]

I will put my pictures from the Bolton museum of 5th Century textiles up on photobucket and send you a link - I will also give you a more detailed explanation of stitch types etc in the next couple of days..

I'm at conferences until after the wknd in Scotland, so I can provide more info after that time

Claire

[Graham Sumner]

Hello Tim

Graham Sumner has produced an excellent and in my opinion near exhaustive, and objective study of colour, but I do not feel has really thrashed out weaves and stitching.

Thanks, however remember I am an illustrator not a weaver so excuse the bias. I presume you are after first century Legionary tunics etc..for Northern Europe? Sadly not much to go on so you have to look further afield and generally to later periods as Claire will show you. However if you want to be as accurate as possible then it is best not to rush and do some research of your own before starting. Try tracking down the articles by Hero Granger Taylor listed in my Bibliography. Also look for the articles on the Nahal Hever tunics.

Winter gear in the main seems to consist of more of everything so you can have under, as well as over cloaks. But if you want accurate designs for these sadly they do not exist. The best ideas for paenula cloaks are those shown in the articles I have suggested.

Graham.

[Tim Edwards]

Claire,

I'd very much appreciate that.

Graham,

Thanks for the reply.

I did not mean to criticise negatively. Your books have been inspirational thusfar, providing a lot of start points for research. What I now need to do is chase the sources for details of original construction.

My problem is less the scarcity of original finds, but rather that the details of what has been found are difficult to obtain.

The Thorsberg clothing is a good example, and is shown in a plethora of internet sites and books, but almost no-one comments on the weave or the seams.

If one seriously wants to make an accurate reconstruction, of the cut, colour, weave, and stitching - where do you turn? Some dusty University libaray inevitably, but I had hoped to shortcut the time and expense by asking on RAT.

I'm not expecting to find clear patterns for extant first century legionary tunics from Europe, but to look at the range of standard stitching techniques employed on normal civilian garb, paired with research on woven fragments from military sites with sealed wet levels, such as Mainz, Windisch and Vindolanda.

I'll chase up the Nahal Hever evidence.

Can anyone recommend the Northern Archaeological Textiles series?

Which UK universities will hold decent a range of archaeological textile related publications, and are accesible to the public?

[Tim Edwards]

As an aside, is the following biblical quote likely to refer to the tubular selvedge you mention on page 23 of Roman Military Clothing? or is this something different:

John 19:23-25 (c90 CE)
When the soldiers had crucified Jesus they took his garments and made four parts, one for each soldier; also his tunic. But the tunic was without seam, woven from top to bottom; so they said to one another, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be." This was to fulfill the scripture, "They parted my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots." So the soldiers did this.

[Cheyenne]

Hello again, I couldn't resist!

The book I have on the riding costume from egypt has lots of good info on weave type and my pictures from the Bolton museum have macro shots of the weave type too - so you can pretty much figure it out from there.

Weave type would most likely be a loden (felted melton true warp/weft) semi waterproof for your Paenula. Salvedge edging is usually the up and over style where the weave has been folded back 2 weft into 4 warp.

You would also do well to look for a diamond twill in 4mm diametre for any higher status items - fringed edging for cloaks.

The majority of fabrica made military tunics would probably have been either 1:1 warp weft or 2:4 warp weft - the simplest, quickest and cheapest to produce en masse.

Remember, the reason these earlier tunics were of the same dimensions was that they were theoretically able to fit any soldier - so the cut and finish would probably have been rather rough - I would say a tight weave (in 2mm) worsted yarn would be the most hard wearing also.

I will provide some sources for after the wknd

[Graham Sumner]

Hi Tim

John Peter Wild's 'Textiles in Archaeology' in the Shire series is a good starting point. Also his chapter in the Vindolanda research report II The Early Wooden Forts, which you might be able to order direct from the site museum shop. Otherwise the articles by H. Granger-Taylor I suggested earlier.

The bulk of the clothing from Vindolanda was 2/2 diamond twill. His chapter also includes details of selvedges, hems, seams and stitching. The report is really a must have as it also includes details of the type of boots you will need and how they are stitched too!

To get your clothing made quickly and to avoid doing a lot of research (and it took me ten years to find what is in my books) the most obvious answer to me is to hand over your material to someone like Claire and pay her to make them for you.

Claire is in Manchester and the University Library there is where I did a lot of my research but you have to pay to get an external readers card

Otherwise, yes it is the dusty library shelves for you!

Graham.

[Cheyenne]

Indeed,

I'm at Manchester - but I am no longer a member of the university. The good thing is - I can still access the library as an alumni. So if anyone needs source material, then I can still take up to 10 books out at a time. I'm currently doing my MA in Landscape archaeology at York - the library at York is also second to none!

Manchester is probably one of the best places in the UK to do any research into Roman textiles - JP Wild is still an honorary lecturer at the university and Cacilia Fluck, the scholar that co-edited the volume on the egyptian riding clothing teaches there too.

I could indeed sew up the tunic/clothing for you Tim, thats not a problem. Sometimes, however, its even more fun to do it yourself as you get a real understanding of timescales, effort and attache from working with specific materials.

The material you have sounds really interesting

[Tim Edwards]

Claire,

Agreed, its best to try making ones own things where possible, as you learn more and have more fun. Definitely the more you put in, the more you get out.

We held our first dyeing workshop last weekend, mainly playing with madder dye:

http://virtuallegionary.blogspot.com/20 ... kshop.html

And here is my first sleeved tunic:

http://virtuallegionary.blogspot.com/20 ... ark-1.html

I'm currently adding clavii to my old tunic, before finally finishing my quilted linen subarmilis... lots to do!

Graham,

Thanks for the sources, I've ordered a few books, and am now chasing Hero Granger Taylor's work.

Are you aware of this?:

http://ctr.hum.ku.dk/upload/application ... %20May.pdf

Its an abstract from a Military Textile Conference, apparently reporting finds of linen pteryges (in a sensible weft twined method - highly appropriate!! [and a future project methinks..])

Do you know anyone who attended?

The CTR are promising this:

Marie-Louise Nosch & Judit Pasztokai-Szeöke (eds.), Roman Military Textiles. Historia. Supplement volume. Erfurt (In preparation, forthcoming 2009)

It sounds VERY interesting!!!

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Very interesting about the ptrurgues!

Also looks like an interesting course!

[jvrjenivs]

We held our first dyeing workshop last weekend, mainly playing with madder dye:

http://virtuallegionary.blogspot.com/20 ... kshop.html

And here is my first sleeved tunic:

http://virtuallegionary.blogspot.com/20 ... ark-1.html

I'm currently adding clavii to my old tunic, before finally finishing my quilted linen subarmilis... lots to do!

Wow, that just seems cool. Wanted to try that out myself for some time. Think I gonna bookmark your blog. Interesting stuff. Good luck with all your projects!

[Tim Edwards]

Jurjen,

Thanks. Dyeing cloth turns out to be surprisingly straightforward, provided you follow the correct process and dont take shortcuts.

We got a beautiful range of madder reds, many of which proved fast to aggressive rinseing afterwards.

I highly recommend the following supplier of dyestuffs:

http://www.fibrecrafts.com/ColourCrafts.asp

That aside, colour is a side issue for me. I want to work towards weatherproof and accurate clothing. The next workshop will focus on felting our outer layers, and putting the lanolin back into the cloth. I've got a big tub ready to go!

The Thorsbjerg tunic is a useful piece of kit, worth reconstructing. The slitted cuffs can be rolled over the hand for warmth, or back up the arm for working. This first reconstruction was a trial piece, the next one will be completely hand spun, woven and dyed, as best the evidence allows.

Although based on a single find beyond the frontier, I believe it would have been a typical clothing item for Northern Roman soldiers, as similar cuffs are visible on numeous Rhineland cavalry stelae, the Mainz Column base, the Lancaster cavalry tombstone. The Gallic Vacheres warrior sculpture even demonstrates a similar seam pattern.

We'll be testing out some of the foul weather kit in the Taunus Mountains and Brecon Beacons!

I'd be very interested to speak to anyone who has seen the archaeological collections in Copenhagen...