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SILK is CORRUPTING our MANLY ROMAN SOCIETY (ArchonOfFlesh) (infosec.pub)

submitted 6 days ago by PugJesus@piefed.social to c/historymemes@piefed.social

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[–] PugJesus@piefed.social 21 points 6 days ago (3 children)

Explanation: As the Roman Empire expanded to become massive and wealthy in the 2nd century BCE-1st century AD, the formerly rough society of farmer-soldiers was exposed to all sorts of new and exciting luxuries - like spices, perfumes, and S I L K. This, to Roman moralists, was CORRUPTING and FOREIGN and would make Rome WEAK and EFFEMINATE. One Roman writer during the Empire, if memory serves, bitches about women in public wearing silk so thin that it was see-through.

Of course, such bitching about THE CORRUPT AND LUXURIOUS YOUTH is as old as society itself, and had a long history in Roman writing as well - dating back to at least the written works of Cato the Elder after the Second Punic War, wherein he condemns such dangerous Gr*ekoid notions as 'literature' and 'doctors' as foreign and unsuitable for REAL Romans. Scipio Africanus, savior of the Republic, on the other hand, was a noted Graecophile.

Funny enough, the Roman conqueror and dictator Julius Caesar was noted as something of a dandy himself, taking great care of his personal appearance, having his body hair plucked, and always being on the cutting edge of fashion. Caesar once said in regards to the license he allowed his troops, that "They would fight just as well if they reeked of perfume".

[–] FoxyFerengi@startrek.website 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

One Roman writer during the Empire, if memory serves, bitches about women in public wearing silk so thin that it was see-through

“Thy bride might as well clothe herself with a garment of the wind as stand forth publicly naked under her clouds of muslin.” — First-century C.E. Roman author Petronius.

https://medium.com/illumination-curated/a-historical-journey-of-muslin-pride-485070bfe53b

He was talking about Dhaka muslin

[–] shawn1122@sh.itjust.works 8 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

But while Victorian Londoners were fawning over the fabric, those who produced it were being pushed into debt and financial ruin. As the book Goods from the East, 1600–1800 explains, the East India Company first started meddling with the delicate process of manufacturing Dhaka muslin in the late 18th Century.

First the company replaced the region’s usual customers with those from the British Empire. "They really put a stranglehold on its production and came to control the whole trade," says Ashmore. Then they came down hard on the industry, pressurising the weavers to produce higher volumes of the fabric at lower prices.

As weavers struggled to keep up with these demands, they fell into debt, explains Ashmore. They were paid upfront for the cloth, which could take up to a year to make. But if the fabric was not considered to be up to the required standard, they would have to pay it all back. "They could never really keep up with these debt repayments," she says.

The final blow came from competition. Colonial enterprises such as the East India Company had been engaged in documenting the industries they relied on for years, and muslin was no exception. Every step of the process of making the fabric was recorded in meticulous detail.

As the European thirst for luxury fabrics increased, there was an incentive to make cheaper versions closer to home. In the county of Lancashire in northwest England, the textile baron Samuel Oldknow combined the British Empire’s insider knowledge with state-of-the-art technology, the spinning wheel, to supply Londoners with vast quantities. By 1784, he had 1,000 weavers working for him.

Though the British-made muslin didn’t come close to Dhaka’s original – it was made with ordinary cotton, and woven at significantly lower thread counts – the combination of decades of mistreatment and a sudden decline in the need for imported textiles killed it off for good.

Interesting story of capitalistic greed and industrialization destroying an ancient practice in favor of a lower quality product.

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