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When do tunics commonly start displaying clavii?
Within my group (Claudius to Flavian era) we are considering how appropriate it would be to switch en masse to tunics with clavii.
I am currently arguing for clavii, but those against are arguing that this was a mark of high status individuals, and/or that this is a later, ie Hadrianic phenomenon.
I am not convinced, as there are clear depictions of tunics with clavii on Pompeian frescoes (with a decent terminus ante quem, if ever there was one!)
The Fayum portaits show these as near universal, but again, the bulk of these are not first century AD, and presumably of well to do people in formal attire.
I am aware of actual tunic finds from Mons Claudianus and Nahal Hever which show the ubiquitous clavii, but again, these are seemingly Second Century AD.
Finally, are any of these evidence sets readily applicable to the Northen Provinces?
I'd love to know the dating of the cavalry stela depicting clavii, that Christian posed from Augsberg.
Tim Edwards
Leg II Avg (UK)
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Read your Sumner Tim!
Graham depicts clavi on a tunic as early as c. AD 30, although he discussed only the earliest use of purple clavi on a military tunic.
Btw, it's clavus (s), clavi (pl). :wink:
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Ahh, saw it in an Osprey Book-therefore it must be right!!!
Like your style... 
I'm at work right now, but I'll dig out my copy as soon as I get back. Joking aside, Graham's work will inevitably be the first source we turn to.
If memory serves, that was just a colour plate in the middle. If there is concrete evidence for clavi on soldiers in AD30 I will be a happy man.
Please excuse my latin there, I blame the lamentable standards of the modern British schooling system, thus absolving myself of any gross error...
Tim Edwards
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Hi Tim
As you have already pointed out clavi appear in many Pompeian scenes and they date back to Etruscan times so no problems as regards date. Unless dyed with the most expensive purples they are certainly not a sign of high status either. Most of the surviving garments seem to flagrantly disregard the supposed rules about the width of clavi too.
Concrete evidence for soldiers wearing them at an early date is a bit harder to find. However the tombstone of a first century Auxiliary from Rabat appears to have them. He is from a Tungrian Cohort. There is a textile fragment from Vindolanda with a gamma motif which is possibly from a cloak and you find those designs in Egypt, so no logical reason why you can not have tunics with clavi in the Northern provinces.
There was a red tunic with black clavi found in one of the caves in Israel associated with the Hadrianic revolt and remains of at least one more has been found recently in Egypt at one of the military posts.
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.
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Hi Tim,
Quote:Ahh, saw it in an Osprey Book-therefore it must be right!!!
Like your style...
[solemn]Not an Osprey Book Tim, but a Sumner Book.. [/solemn] :wink:
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Good one! 8)
M. Demetrius Abicio
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Quote:
There was a red tunic with black clavi found in one of the caves in Israel associated with the Hadrianic revolt and remains of at least one more has been found recently in Egypt at one of the military posts.
Graham.
Ahhh, just what I have been wanting to hear!! 
Visne partem mei capere? Comminus agamus! * Me semper rogo, Quid faceret Iulius Caesar? * Confidence is a good thing! Overconfidence is too much of a good thing.
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Byron Angel
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Byron wrote
Quote:Ahhh, just what I have been wanting to hear!!
I knew you would, that's why I wrote it!
Robert wrote
Quote:[solemn]Not an Osprey Book Tim, but a Sumner Book.. [/solemn]
:oops:
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.
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For the Nahal Hever Tunic, do we know about the date on it. That is not clear to me though for some reason 135 AD keeps popping in my mind.
Thanks
Mike Daniels
a.k.a
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Legio VI FFC.
If not me...who?
If not now...when?
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Quote:For the Nahal Hever Tunic, do we know about the date on it. That is not clear to me though for some reason 135 AD keeps popping in my mind.
Quite right, it comes from the so-called Cave of Letters, and dates to the 2nd Jewish revolt. Literature is:
Yadin, Yigael. The Finds from the Bar Kokhba Period in the Cave of Letters. Jerusalem, Israel Exploration Society, 1963.
Some of the bags I did were found there ...
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