5 ms·

Linen is also going to be cheaper than bronze (and later iron), even though linen fabric is quite an expensive material by the standards of a pre-industrial soc

by dsr_ 4y ago

Linen is also going to be cheaper than bronze (and later iron), even though linen fabric is quite an expensive material by the standards of a pre-industrial society. If you can grow flax, you get edible flaxseed, flaxseed oil, and linen fibers for thread and then weaving... and next year, hopefully, you get a new crop of flax. Save the bronze for your swords.

giantg2 4y ago
If I remember correctly, if you harvest for fibers, that's before it goes into seed.
- kurupt213 4y ago
  I thought it’s the seed stalk. The seed for oil, the stalk for fiber. The oil could have even been used as the polymeric resin for gluing the layers (and is very water resistant when it cures)
- whtrbt 4y ago
  Someone posted this link above (https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/ https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/) which indicates that separating the seed is part of the processing.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    This says there are many opinions in when is best to harvest the fibers, and that they believe it is before the seeds are ripe. http://hoe-farming.com/growing-and-harvesting-linen-flax/ http://hoe-farming.com/growing-and-harvesting-linen-flax/
Retric 4y ago
Iron was likely relatively cheap to produce compared to Linen. You can find various YouTube videos of people processing iron ore by hand fairly rapidly though it takes significant quantities of wood or coal. Something like 2 weeks of labor to the extract and process raw ore for enough iron to make a breastplate seems likely. Though transportation would be an issue. Linen on the other hand required extreme processing simply to get thread and takes up valuable farmland, but could be produced locally. https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/ https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/ Linen armor would only have been relatively cheap as a means of recycling old garments. However, that’s likely to degrade it’s protective value.
- acjohnson55 4y ago
  Interesting! That aligns with my understanding is that the real revolution of the iron age was not that iron was a superior material (at least initially), but that it was much more abundant than copper and (especially) tin for bronze, which democratized which people and societies were able to build iron gear. A compelling theory to me of the late bronze age collapse is that in the bronze age, you had a very globalized society for the purpose of keeping the bronze supply chain intact. But ironworking eliminated the interdependence and the importance of the elite networks that sustained the supply chain. So then the whole "civilized" world quickly fragmented into much more micro polities. Many of the states that made the transition from Bronze Age to Iron Age relatively intact already had well developed ironworking. The Assyrians were able to build a new value proposition for international empire. They institutionalized many of the civil and engineering innovations we attribute to the post-Roman world, kicking off what would become the classical era.
- scarmig 4y ago
  Raw ore wasn't the limiting factor for iron production: it was all about the wood. Coal has the issues that, without coking, it neither burns hot enough nor clean enough (i.e. it adds lots of sulfur to the iron, and the resulting alloy is inferior for pretty much all purposes). As a result, iron and steel production wasn't as bound by locality to mines nearly as much as it was by locality to fuel sources (i.e. forests). To give a sense for the figures involved, 1kg of iron would require around 15kg of charcoal, which itself would have to be charcoaled from >100kg of wood. From this, you end up seeing things like Elba being entirely deforested by the time of Caesar, and its still productive iron mines would have their ores shipped to the mainland for processing.
  - kurupt213 4y ago
    Lebanon was covered in forests until the iron age
    - dredmorbius 4y ago
      Iron? Or bronze? I'd thought that the deforestation was already advanced by Greek times, though I can't find a clear reference to when or what factors were involved.
kurupt213 4y ago
I’ve read a lot about the hoplite battlefield. I would rather be in a bronze corselet if facing another hoplite phalanx (which was the common city state standoff in the archaic and early classical period). Also, the bronze xyphos largely disappeared with Bronze Age society. Some soldiers preferred them to iron swords in the archaic period because a bronze sword could be recast by its owner if it broke, where a blacksmith was required to reforge an iron one (though the iron sword was much less like to break and held its edge much better)

by dsr_ 4y ago

giantg2 4y ago

If I remember correctly, if you harvest for fibers, that's before it goes into seed.

kurupt213 4y ago
I thought it’s the seed stalk. The seed for oil, the stalk for fiber. The oil could have even been used as the polymeric resin for gluing the layers (and is very water resistant when it cures)
whtrbt 4y ago
Someone posted this link above (https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/ https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/) which indicates that separating the seed is part of the processing.
- giantg2 4y ago
  This says there are many opinions in when is best to harvest the fibers, and that they believe it is before the seeds are ripe. http://hoe-farming.com/growing-and-harvesting-linen-flax/ http://hoe-farming.com/growing-and-harvesting-linen-flax/

Retric 4y ago

Iron was likely relatively cheap to produce compared to Linen. You can find various YouTube videos of people processing iron ore by hand fairly rapidly though it takes significant quantities of wood or coal. Something like 2 weeks of labor to the extract and process raw ore for enough iron to make a breastplate seems likely. Though transportation would be an issue. Linen on the other hand required extreme processing simply to get thread and takes up valuable farmland, but could be produced locally. https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/ https://ulsterlinen.com/flax-to-linen/ Linen armor would only have been relatively cheap as a means of recycling old garments. However, that’s likely to degrade it’s protective value.

acjohnson55 4y ago
Interesting! That aligns with my understanding is that the real revolution of the iron age was not that iron was a superior material (at least initially), but that it was much more abundant than copper and (especially) tin for bronze, which democratized which people and societies were able to build iron gear. A compelling theory to me of the late bronze age collapse is that in the bronze age, you had a very globalized society for the purpose of keeping the bronze supply chain intact. But ironworking eliminated the interdependence and the importance of the elite networks that sustained the supply chain. So then the whole "civilized" world quickly fragmented into much more micro polities. Many of the states that made the transition from Bronze Age to Iron Age relatively intact already had well developed ironworking. The Assyrians were able to build a new value proposition for international empire. They institutionalized many of the civil and engineering innovations we attribute to the post-Roman world, kicking off what would become the classical era.
scarmig 4y ago
Raw ore wasn't the limiting factor for iron production: it was all about the wood. Coal has the issues that, without coking, it neither burns hot enough nor clean enough (i.e. it adds lots of sulfur to the iron, and the resulting alloy is inferior for pretty much all purposes). As a result, iron and steel production wasn't as bound by locality to mines nearly as much as it was by locality to fuel sources (i.e. forests). To give a sense for the figures involved, 1kg of iron would require around 15kg of charcoal, which itself would have to be charcoaled from >100kg of wood. From this, you end up seeing things like Elba being entirely deforested by the time of Caesar, and its still productive iron mines would have their ores shipped to the mainland for processing.
- kurupt213 4y ago
  Lebanon was covered in forests until the iron age
  - dredmorbius 4y ago
    Iron? Or bronze? I'd thought that the deforestation was already advanced by Greek times, though I can't find a clear reference to when or what factors were involved.

kurupt213 4y ago

I’ve read a lot about the hoplite battlefield. I would rather be in a bronze corselet if facing another hoplite phalanx (which was the common city state standoff in the archaic and early classical period). Also, the bronze xyphos largely disappeared with Bronze Age society. Some soldiers preferred them to iron swords in the archaic period because a bronze sword could be recast by its owner if it broke, where a blacksmith was required to reforge an iron one (though the iron sword was much less like to break and held its edge much better)