dyeing linen

[Tim Edwards]

Like Graham, I don't think this is a question of whether the Romans could or would dye linen, but did they?

There are thousands upon thousands of Roman textile fragments from Israel and Egypt, which should give a starting impression of what might have been normal at least for that region.

I am going to Exeter University library next week to look at some of the Mons Claudianus reports. I will see if there is any record of dyed linen amongst the hundreds of textile fragments excavated.

I must admit, it has long puzzled me that there seems to be an absence of evidence for dyed linen from the Roman world, from my own limited experience, it is not difficult to achieve.
I spent an afternoon examining coptic textiles from the V & A Museum, and found it odd that where coloured clavi and orbiculi were added to linen tunics, they always seemed to be executed in dyed wool.

If I was you I'd keep your focale undyed. I made my focale from a beautiful piece of hand spun, hand woven diamond twill wool, which I dyed red with alum mordanted madder. This was well and good until I wore it under mail and a quilted subarmalis whilst on a route march. I now have a ghastly pink blob on my linen subarmalis where I was heavily sweating.

I have some nice hand woven linen for my next focale, which I will be using more as a sweat rag than padding for the neck (the subarmalis does this more than adequately). I will not be dyeing it!