I posted some info on the possible edge finishing of 1st century tunics - below are some pictures of the finished tunic I have made for occasional RAT contributor Yurko.
I have used a pattern based upon a very late North European iron age (1st century bc) 5 piece tunic which could have overlapped into the patterns of the occupation era.
The dye is Armenian Cochineal and although it was considered exotic, it was still cheaper than obtaining shellfish purple. It has a purple red hue, rather than the South American cochineal which is more crimson. Armenian cochineal is said to have been available during the 1st century from the east as a substitute for Kermes even though the shade is slightly different.
Hi Claire! Verry nice item!!
I have question - where are the ornamented bands from, the evidence? (I wrote the question about the early imperial ornaments here in my theme)
Do you sell this tunic with sleeves?
I posted a bit of info about the bands that could have been in use during the early imperial period - the researcher of the Hochdorf bands has written extensively about edge binding with decoration in the early roman occupation era.
The dye is Armenian Cochineal and although it was considered exotic, it was still cheaper than obtaining shellfish purple. It has a purple red hue, rather than the South American cochineal which is more crimson. Armenian cochineal is said to have been available during the 1st century from the east as a substitute for Kermes even though the shade is slightly different.
Just wondering Claire why you did not use madder? Or is this supposed to be an upper class tunic which you refer too in another thread on cavalry tunics?
If a cavalry tunic you could have chosen one with those turned back cuffs, although others have argued they are possibly awards or even gloves!
As you probably know there is an argument that the 2:1 twill textiles found on Germanic sites only appear during the Roman Iron Age and that they came originally from Roman Gaul, either as loot or via returning Roman Auxiliaries. So something like the Thorsberg tunic may have belonged to a Roman Auxiliary and historians now believe it too was red originally based on recent dye research.
That is of course of a later date and apart from the cavalry tunics I have not seen any infantry tunics of first century date with sleeves. In fact those on the German tombstones look a very different style of tunic altogether, perhaps even influenced by eastern fashion not Gallic.
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.
Hi Graham S.!
Are you the autor of the books about the Roman dress?
I found i different forums and articles a lot of zitats from your books: i am researching and interested of dress, described in your first book (BC/1. cent. AD) because i am doing 1. cent. BC /the beginning and the end of it/
But what is my question on you:
you didn't wrote any reference to the Claire tablet-woven bands? Why?
The ornaments on the late la Tenne dress&roman early imperial dress is my lovely theme.
But in our debate here about the Falkirk tartan: some RAT members means, that in later roman time and army some stranger mans who were also members of the roman army could use the checkered clothes, too.
Well if this goes, than is all right with the tunic wich makes the Claire, too. She makes tunic for the mens from GB, but Graham: did you mean in your text the evidented items from GB, or from the continent? Zitat of your text here: "In fact those on the German tombstones look a very different style of tunic altogether, perhaps even influenced by eastern fashion not Gallic."
You should to use the GB evidence - maybe in GB the tunic were made of checkered textiles, aswell: the meaning comes from the textes about the Falkirk tartan-item. If they were checkered: that means in the style of the old inhabitants (barbarians). They used the tunic with sleves, sure and more:
we can find much threads in different forms and articles about the roman military dress in the cold weather, in the winter (f.e.: see the references on the Vicus site from UK) Will anybody say, that in cold weather and rain in the Nord, any roman time-periode, will be enough to wear only the short-sleves tunic with a Byrrus or sagum?
The same problem is with the roman trousers: pants, leg-wrappings, breeches, feminalia - all kind of the items: originaly we all know, that in the south provinces the solders didn't weare them. But during the time, when the roman-expansion went to the Nord, they protected them with better, warmer dress.
So i mean: the tunic with sleves goes in 1. cent. AD in UK by the cold and rainy weather.
Sorry for my bad english, regards from Slovenia!!
Joze
The dye is Armenian Cochineal and although it was considered exotic, it was still cheaper than obtaining shellfish purple. It has a purple red hue, rather than the South American cochineal which is more crimson. Armenian cochineal is said to have been available during the 1st century from the east as a substitute for Kermes even though the shade is slightly different.
Just wondering Claire why you did not use madder? Or is this supposed to be an upper class tunic which you refer too in another thread on cavalry tunics?
If a cavalry tunic you could have chosen one with those turned back cuffs, although others have argued they are possibly awards or even gloves!
As you probably know there is an argument that the 2:1 twill textiles found on Germanic sites only appear during the Roman Iron Age and that they came originally from Roman Gaul, either as loot or via returning Roman Auxiliaries. So something like the Thorsberg tunic may have belonged to a Roman Auxiliary and historians now believe it too was red originally based on recent dye research.
That is of course of a later date and apart from the cavalry tunics I have not seen any infantry tunics of first century date with sleeves. In fact those on the German tombstones look a very different style of tunic altogether, perhaps even influenced by eastern fashion not Gallic.
Graham.
Hi Graham,
this is for a cavalry impression - and yes, it is for a middle upper/upper status officer. That was the brief that Yurko gave to me. I decided on the use of Armenian Cochineal as it needed to look a bit special.
The pattern is early. I didn't want to use Thorsberg as it seems to be the standard pattern that many people use even for earlier impressions. I wanted to use a pattern for Yurko which could be linked back to a very early imperial cavalry unit stationed in Northern Europe. It could very well be that this officer brought it back from the east, or that the cloth was booty and it was then made into a tunic closer to home.
I'm not sure I totally agree about the 2/1 twills being entirely Gaulish imports, its too difficult to prove with the use of stylistic analysis. The other issue with this is the period cut off adjustments we need to make when dealing with terms such as 'Roman Iron Age' - this is a distinctly European term - specifically coined by archaeology to refer to the Danish contextual evidence (as their textiles are in far better shape than ours too). Usually this refers to 50BCE to 400CE if i'm not mistaken. Whereas here we are 43CE - 410CE.
This tunic is a very very early Auxilia Cavalry example. Possibly only just after Roman occupation begins in North West Europe, possibly even before Britain is occupied - at the beginning of the 1st century AD...
Hi Graham S.!
Are you the autor of the books about the Roman dress?
Yes, guilty as charged!
you didn't wrote any reference to the Claire tablet-woven bands? Why?
In the post above or in my books? Claire herself has given a reference in the thread about cavalry tunics.
But in our debate here about the Falkirk tartan: some RAT members means, that in later roman time and army some stranger mans who were also members of the roman army could use the checkered clothes, too.
It is not surprising to find that textiles of native type have been found in what would have been the frontier district. However it is something else to say that this is clear evidence that it was worn by soldiers in the Roman army.
As an illustrator / former re-enactor, I like the idea of dressing Roman troops in native fashions. There are certainly analogies with other periods, it is exotic and makes for good illustrations and fascinating re-constructions.
However as an former re-enactor / archaeological illustrator, if you are presenting such material to the public who will believe what you show to be truthful then hypothetically if asked by a member of the public what I have based such re-constructions on, then I would prefer to say it is based on sound archaeological evidence from a particular site of the right period or some pictorial or literary evidence from the Roman period, rather than say I copied the idea from another re-enactor or from what I believe I read somewhere.
She makes tunic for the mens from GB, but Graham: did you mean in your text the evidented items from GB, or from the continent? Zitat of your text here: "In fact those on the German tombstones look a very different style of tunic altogether, perhaps even influenced by eastern fashion not Gallic."
You should to use the GB evidence - maybe in GB the tunic were made of checkered textiles, aswell:
Sadly there is not the same comparable evidence from Britain to match the first century tombstones from Germany. This also applies to elsewhere. There is no similar group of first century tombstones of the quality of the German ones. There are some first century tombstones from Britain which show cavalry apparently wearing long sleeved tunics but none which show first century infantry and certainly none with the draped tunic shown on the German tombstones in such fine detail. Some tombstones from North Africa show Auxilia but in the simple Roman type tunic. However their quality of detail does not match the German ones either.
There is however more work on textiles in Germany at the moment, so maybe some answers to your questions may come in the next few years. I am also very interested in this particular subject myself and will continue to research it as well.
They used the tunic with sleves, sure and more:
we can find much threads in different forms and articles about the roman military dress in the cold weather, in the winter (f.e.: see the references on the Vicus site from UK) Will anybody say, that in cold weather and rain in the Nord, any roman time-periode, will be enough to wear only the short-sleves tunic with a Byrrus or sagum?
The same problem is with the roman trousers: pants, leg-wrappings, breeches, feminalia - all kind of the items: originaly we all know, that in the south provinces the solders didn't weare them. But during the time, when the roman-expansion went to the Nord, they protected them with better, warmer dress.
So i mean: the tunic with sleves goes in 1. cent. AD in UK by the cold and rainy weather.
It is very true and common sense that the Romans eventually adopted native fashions for cold and hot weather clothing, because influence from the east was much stronger. However they already had the Paenula and tended at first just to wear more tunics and cloaks in cold weather before adopting long sleeved tunics and trousers. ( The Vindolanda documents mention both undercloaks and overcloaks!) However while we do have artistic and literary sources for the long sleeved tunics, trousers, bracae, leg bindings and wrappings from Roman times (although some not before the third century) etc...being worn by Roman troops, as far as I know we do not have the same type of evidence for native British and Gallic style textiles being worn by Roman troops, except for a few literary references to very senior officers adopting native fashions and being criticised for doing so.
When we see the third century military ensemble of long sleeved tunic trousers and sagum cloak, in art and sculpture they are not decorated with old fashioned Gallic or Germanic patterns but a mixture of classical Roman clavi and eastern styles. Equally all the textiles from Roman Egypt are not decorated with old fashioned Egyptian patterns but again with classical motifs.
When we hear of Roman soldiers being sent to Gaul to collect clothing, I assume some people think this means they are collecting old fashioned 'Asterix' type clothes and this supports the wearing of tartan like material at re-enactments. However this is like saying a rich villa owner in South Eastern Britain sends off an order for pottery from Gaul and was expecting to receive some antique rustic pottery, rather than the posh samian ware. The Gallic textile industry was taken over and geared up for the Roman market.
Of course the Roman Army would also hire native mercenaries from beyond the frontiers and these undoubtedly would wear their own clothing, like those shown on Trajan,s column. However I assuming these are not the type of 'Roman' troops you wish to re-construct.
I hope this has been of some help.
Claire.
The reason behind the argument for the textiles found in Germany and Scandinavia being of Gallo Roman origin is that they only appear in Scandinavia and Germany at the same time as the Roman Empire exists in Northern Europe. However you would not be the only person to disagree with this way of thinking.
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.
Hi Graham!
Yes, it helps a lot!
I know mostly the facts you wrote them here (differences between the 1. cent. AD/ 3. cent. AD: types + details, like the ornaments etc..: see my link to the board flavii-forum in paralelle theme here i linked yesterday); it's my way of doing LH, too.
But if we don't have the evidence for long sleved tunic 1. cent. AD in UK - we can't say it goes or it doesn't goes: because we don't have any evidence
The fact about the many tunic&cloaks wearing-style (Vindolanda) i know, too.
Maybe it helps this suggestion:
i found evidence in pre-roman time for long sleved tunic on one Illyrian fresco: and some textile recearchers believe, that the Illyrian type of kilt = fustanella dating in european Urnfeld time was the prototype of all later style of the tunic in Europe because it is theevidence for the first european tunics. Two small figures wearing this type of kilt comes from Maribor, Slovenia - that is very close to my home.
About the Gallic-tradition textile design i worte here many times in the theme of the Falkirk tartan: the checkered-style by the Gauls and other barbarians is a myth. 1. the type of the checkered design was not so highly structurated like by the tartans 2.the weaving art was in continental tradition different 2. there are enough items for monochrome textiles used by the barbarians, too. Yes, Asterix'y style is a mith.
The figures on the Traian-columne i know, too. And my meaning about the barbarian-style used by the Romans was in the thread here in forum about the Falkirk tartan the same with your meaning here: it goes by individual items, but not in the way of the main stream as a "roman-military-dress-code" -style. It is possibile that some warriors used this type of items - but it was not a rule for all mens.
I know for myselve reenacting fact: it is a little bit harder to reconstruct the dress of the 1. cent. BC/1. cent. AD as up of the 3. cent. AD: in later time is easyer.
Quote:they only appear in Scandinavia and Germany at the same time as the Roman Empire exists in Northern Europe.
Does this hypothesis take into account the Twill textiles from Denmark from before the occupation? (Hald 1980, Barber 1991) - I get the impression much of the debate centres around the age old question of cultural diffusion from a central point to outward peripheries
""Does this hypothesis take into account the Twill textiles from Denmark from before the occupation?""
I think, Claire, you are right: the twill exist since the Urnfeld textile-tradition, via Hallstatt and la Tenne to gallo-roman and roman time. My friends from Germany says, that the textile items of 1. cent. AD shows strong traditional (native) influence and that means that old weaving-techniques survived the transition to the roman imperial age, what can we see by the Vindolanda's items some centuries later.
Does this hypothesis take into account the Twill textiles from Denmark from before the occupation?
Apparently the textiles in question are the so called Virring type. In some cases I believe they are also found with Roman artefacts. How they got where they are found and who made them is what is open for debate.
It could well be that they fall into one of those, the Barbarians were not sophisticated enough to make them so they must be Roman,types of arguments.
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.
