124 FORCED LABOUR: PAYING TAX WITH TEXTILES In order to provide for the soldiers of the Roman Empire, from the 2nd century CE onwards citizens were obliged to pay taxes to pay for the soldiers’ food and clothing.13 The tax for military attire, known as the vestis militaris, could be paid in cash or textiles. We know this from legal texts, documents and letters. A papyrus tells us that in the years 310–311 CE, the village of Karanis in Upper Egypt had to supply a total of 24 tunics and eight cloaks for the Roman legions.14 A document from Antinoopolis in central Egypt records that in 324 a woman named Isadora delivered a chlamys, a semicircular cloak, and a sticharion, a tunic, as payment of the vestis militaris.15 Apart from his armour, a soldier’s clothing was no different from that of a civilian: soldiers wore a tunic and a chlamys, a semicircular cloak held together by a brooch on the left shoulder. Special padding and protective textiles needed to be worn under the armour.16 Textiles from a military context have been preserved from Dura Europos, a 3rd-century CE Roman military base in modern- day Syria (fig. 7).17 RECAPITULATION Textile production in late antiquity was associated with various forms of dependency, as were all parts of the ancient economy. We looked at some of these aspects here. Slaves were undoubtedly employed in textile production; there are isolated references to this in the written sources, but it is impossible to draw a clear picture from them. 1 Droß-Krüpe 2011, 47–102. 2 Bouchaud et al. 2019, 21. 3 Hildebrand – Paetz gen. Schieck 2020. 4 Bogensperger 2015. 5 Gleba 2008. 6 Steigerwald 1990. 7 DroßKrüpe 2011, 245. 8 Droß-Krüpe 2011, 48–51, 58, 86. 9 Droß-Krüpe 2011, 37. 10 Trinkl 2004; Gazda 2004, 27; Fahldieck 2021. 11 Gottschalk 2015, 116–118. 12 Taylor 2018. 13 Herz 2019. 14 Gazda 2004, 15–16. 15 Livingstone 2023, 89. 16 Wild 1979. 17 Granger-Taylor 2012, 68–73. Bibliography: Bogensperger 2015 I. Bogensperger, Purpur: eine Farbe als Statussymbol, Mitteilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien 145 (2015): 155–171. Bouchaud et al. 2019 C. Bouchaud – E. Yvanez – J. P. Wild, Tightening the Thread from Seed to Cloth: New Inquiries in the Archaeology of Old World Cotton, Revue d´ethnoécologie 15 (2019): 1–31, https://doi.org/10.4000/ethnoecologie.4501. Droß-Krüpe 2011 K. Droß-Krüpe, Wolle – Weber – Wirtschaft: Die Textilproduktion der römischen Kaiserzeit im Spiegel der papyrologischen Überlieferung, Marburger Altertumskundliche Abhandlungen 46 (Wiesbaden 2011). Fahldieck 2021 S. Fahldieck, Forschungen zum byzantinischen Textilgerät aus Assos, in: B. Böhlendorf-Arslan (eds.), Veränderungen von Stadtbild und urbaner Lebenswelt in spätantiker und frühbyzantinischer Zeit: Assos im Spiegel städtischer Zentren Westkleinasiens, Byzanz zwischen Orient und Okzident 23 (Mainz 2021): 117–151, https://books.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/propylaeum/catalog/book/964 [last accessed 03/01/2024]. Gazda 2004 E. K. Gazda (ed.), Karanis: An Egyptian Town in Roman Times: Discoveries of the University of Michigan Expedition to Egypt, Kelsey Museum Publication 1 (Michigan 2004), https://lsa.umich.edu/ content/dam/kelsey-assets/kelsey-publications/pdfs/Karanis_an_Egyptian_Town. pdf [last accessed 22/12/2023]. Gleba 2008 M. Gleba, Auratae Vestes: Gold Textiles in the Ancient Mediterranean, in: C. Alfaro – L. Karali (eds.), Purpureae Vestes: II. Symposium Internacional sobre textiles y tintes del Mediterráneo en el mundo antiguo (Valencia 2008): 61–77. Gottschalk 2015 R. Gottschalk, Spätrömische Gräber im Umfeld von Köln, Rheinische Ausgrabungen 71 (Darmstadt 2015). Granger-Taylor 2012 H. Granger- Taylor, Fragments of Linen from Masada, Israel – The Remnants of Pteryges? – and Related Finds in Weft- and Warp-Twining Including Several Slings, in: M.-L. Nosch (ed.), Wearing the Cloak: Dressing the Soldier in Roman Times, Ancient Textiles Series 10 (Oxford 2012): 56–84. Herz 2019 P. Herz, Vestis Militaris: Die Versorgung des römischen Heeres mit Bekleidung, in: B. Wagner-Hasel – M.-L. Nosch (eds.), Gaben, Waren und Tribute: Stoffkreisläufe und antike Textilökonomie (Stuttgart 2019): 297–316. Hildebrand – Paetz gen. Schieck 2020 B. Hildebrand – A. Paetz gen. Schieck, Seide, Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 30 (2020): 200–211. Livingstone 2023 R. J. Livingstone, When Sorted and Cleaned May Prove of Great Interest: The Textiles from Antinoopolis Held in the Collections of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Tuhinga 34 (2023): 87–104, https://tuhinga.arphahub.com/article/107369/ [last accessed 22/12/2023]. Steigerwald 1990 G. Steigerwald, Das kaiserliche Purpurprivileg in spätrömischer und frühbyzantinischer Zeit, Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 33 (1990): 209–239. Taylor 2018 C. G. Taylor, Late Antique Images of the Virgin Annunciate Spinning, Texts and Studies in Eastern Christianity 11 (Leiden 2018). Trinkl 2004 E. Trinkl, Zum Wirkungskreis einer kleinasiatischen Matrona anhand ausgewählter Funde aus dem Hanghaus 2 in Ephesos, Jahreshefte des Österreichischen Archäologischen Institutes in Wien 73 (2004): 281–304. Wild 1979 J. P. Wild, Fourth-Century Underwear with Special Reference to the Thoracomachus, in: M. W. C. Hassall (ed.), De rebus bellicis, BAR International Series 63 (Oxford 1979): 105–110.
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