Metal plate beneath Linothorakes or Spolades

[PMBardunias]

Evidence? There is no evidence I can think of, off the top of my head that the citizens of any Greek Poleis had access to, or commonly wore linen armour - and even if Aeneas' anecdote is correctly assumed to be referring to linen armour, no evidence that it was intended for Hoplites - it could just as easily have been 'local' armour intended for 'natives'

It does not matter who the armor was intended for. I stated that three types of armor were available to hoplites. Those smuggled Thorakes, as well as the linen armor hanging in a home in Lindos or a treasury in Delos are obviously available. If linen armors were "around" for other troop types, or taken as booty from foreigners, then they were obviously "available". The onus is now on you to tell us why they would not be worn- especially because we know Alexander did so.

You are setting up a straw man here! I never said that no Greek ever wore linen armour, merely that only two types - bronze and leather - are referred to in the literature .Anyway, doesn't this prove the point? The evidence suggests it was rare/uncommon, for instance the very anecdote you refer to. The fact is, when Alexander wore linen armour, it was sufficiently rare as to be remarked on, together with the explicit point that it was a captured Persian piece. The clear implication is that Greeks don't normally wear such 'foreign' armour

Good, now we have gone from "never" to "normally". I never said that linen dominated. I said that linen was available and likely worn by some hoplites. Maybe more in the East, less in the West. Maybe an Acarnanian never saw one, while a rich Athenian with business interests in Melos had one.

Again, this is an assumption - to use your words "not many styles..." If there was leather body-armour, but not of T-and-Y form, it would be called something other than 'spolades', hence 'thorakia skutinous'. Only if the T-and-Y were the sole form of leather armour would the terms be synonymous

Are you suggesting that there is a leather armor in the Delian treasury that is not a T-Y? I should take care because that way leads to Spolades not being T-Ys! Do not arm your opponents.

With all due credit to Ruben for this discovery, there is in fact no actual reference to "linou spoladion" - this is just speculation. Again, you are inferring far to much from "questionable"( your own word) uncertain evidence.

With all respect returned, the evidence is good enough for "questionable" to be appropriate. Moreso in light of the use of Thorakes in both linen and leather.

We do not in fact read of the term 'linothorax' in the sources. As has been pointed out repeatedly in various threads, the term 'linothorax' is not EVER used of hoplite armour....it is a modern borrowing and variation on a Homeric term. The sooner this inaccurate mis-nomer is dropped, the less confusion there will be on the subject.

Does ????????? not refer to linen armor??? Had linen somehow qualitatively changed in a few centuries? Homer speaks of Linen armor, we later read of linen armor. It does not matter if they change the word order, the meaning is linen armor. If it is made of linen and it is armor for the chest the man has a linothorex, A chest protected by linen, colloquialized to linothorax for the armor itself:

??^??-????? , ?_???, Ep. and Ion. ??^??-????? , ????, o(, h(,
A. wearing a linen cuirass, Il.2.529, 830; “???????” AP14.73; [?????????] Str.3.3.6.

Unless you think that every reference to "Thorakes lineou" definitely meant a T-Y, then I could understand why you would want to seperate it out from the armor that Homer speaks of, for which we cannot know the form.

This could be interesting:

??^??-?????? , ??,
A. clad in linen, B.18.43, Hymn.Is. 1.

The citation seems wrong, for I cannot find lino anhything at B.18.43, but there is this:

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... g=original

?????
???? ?? ????? ????? ????? ??????
?????, ???? ?? ?????? ??????;

[Chorus:]
Who is the man said to be, and from where? How is he equipped? Is he leading a great army with weapons of war?

A nice instance of "Stolan" being used like "opla" to mean equipment, maybe armor.

Homer and the T-and-Y are centuries apart from one another!

Hom many centuries between a hardened leather "cuirasse" and the plate of a Curiassier? Here even the very form has changed, but still the word is appropriate.

but Homer's terminology has nothing whatever to do with Classical Hoplite body armour! Would you use other Homeric epithets to derive a name for much later equipment? There is no logic to this!

Yes, I would, as would Strabo if Liddell can be believed. Because the term has no specific homeric meaning, it is simply a way of saying linen corselet in Greek!!!

Which is precisely the point. The word was 'invented' specifically by someone unknown as a name for the T-and-Y corselet

No, it was used by a very good Greek who wrote the Illiad to mean an armor made of linen. That someone used this excellent term, but tried to give it a specific modern meaning it did not bear in the past to any greek is the problem.

The reason that Strabo could describe Lusitanians as "linothaxed"
Strabo does not use this term.

Do you have the Greek for the following? Liddell tells me he does.
"Their corselets are for the most part made of linen; a few have chain-coats and helmets with triple crests, but the others use helmets composed of sinews."

If not all 'linothoraxes' are T-and-Y's, then why call them this modern made-up word, which is an incorrect description, and not even real Greek, to boot? You are here seeking to defend the indefensible.

No, I am not suggesting that we call all T-Ys linothoraxes, that is enough of that! I am saying that we can use a generic greek term for "linen chest armor" coined in the Iliad to refer to any ancinet greek linen armor for the chest no matter what form. Since I am not certain that all Lineo thorakes were T-Y I think this is safer. You could just as correctly called them all Thorakes Lineou, but linothorax is alreay widespread. It is only the definition as a T-Y that is a problem.

I don't believe so. Iron was much harder to work, technically, than other materials, requiring much higher temperatures for example. It was therefore a rarity in armour ( though not simple spear-heads and sword-blades) until those technological masters of iron-work, the Celts, came up with practical iron armour in the form of mail.

You are going to tell me a Greek could make a mild steel sword, but not puch a bunch of scales in the manner his Anatolian neighbors had been doing for centuries?