Spolas (...thorax ek dermatos...)

[John Conyard]

Like so much else about the tube and yoke, the colour is questionable.

On black figure vases armours are painted white, and on red figure vases they are left natural red/orange. On the later Douris cup they are red and black. Etruscan wall paintings show red contrasted with dark blue/black. Ariston has yellow highlighted in blue.

Colour could be dyed, painted or inked. Or even woven into fabric!

I think we could go as far as suggesting vegetable tanned leather can be made many different colours and that such leather tanned using alum would be white which makes a good base for decoration.