Real Deal Spolas

[Sean Manning]

Right, "dunno". but, just because Homer and some others might describe a process for making soft leather, it doesn't mean that was the only way. Buff coats: don't seem to match stiffness in vase depictions --do you see wrinkles in those? (we need to make a distinction between those that might depict quilted linen or twining vs. leather), seem to be used in countries where waterproofing was needed. Folks in Africa have apparently known for a long time how to do it:
http://www.gateway-africa.com/howdidthey...-roots.jpg

http://www.gateway-africa.com/howdidthey...skins.html

---

"Academicky":
https://www.academia.edu/36710424/_Veget...hers_2018_

Have they or are you just assuming that if modern herders and hunter-gatherers do it, ancient ones must have? It seems that people often change subsistence strategies in response to say an outbreak of warfare making it unsafe to farm or a plague killing too many to make the old solution work. They often invent or reinvent 'primitive' solutions which they had not used previously, because none of this stuff is that complicated and because if they don't they die.

So people used to assume that vegetable tanning was primeval, but its just not in the archaeological record of northern Europe until Roman times, and there are kinds of leather which would produce no archaeological evidence which are even simpler to make.

---

I don't see wrinkles in the 17th century buff coats I have seen unless they were cut that way (ie. with a big skirt which is meant to fall in folds), and serious leather armour would probably be several layers sewn together. That would be stiffer. Buff coats were mostly meant to keep the armour from staining the clothing, to stop powder burns, and to stop sword cuts.