Flax as body armor
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Flax as body armor
Pliny briefly indicates something quite remarkable in Book XIX. He references small remnants of a breastplate that belonged to a former king of Egypt named Amasis. This breastplate would have been made of 365 separate threads made from flax. Further research tells us that this type of armor was called linothorax. Due to its ephemeral nature no examples survive. The only comprehensive scholarship on this subject is the book Reconstructing Ancient Linen Body Armor {2013).
Pliny. Natural History. Trans. H. Rackham. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1938), 429.
Pliny. Natural History. Trans. H. Rackham. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1938), 429.