Bedding
Xenophon recommends that an army preparing for a hard campaign bring plenty of clothing but not too much bedding because it is more useful to carry the same weight of provisions (Xenophon, Cyropaedia 6.2.30). His Socrates teases a man who carried nothing but a cloak while his slave staggered along with heavy bedspreads and baggage (Xen. Mem. 3.13.6). Alcibiades’ compromise was to sleep in bands of fabric hanging from the beams of his trireme rather than on the hard deck (Plutarch, Alcibiades, 16.1).
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- Lee, Greek Army, p. 119 (the words στιβάς for a matress, sleeping mat, or pile of rushes/straw and στρῶμα for bedspreads come up)
- Xen. Anab. 5.4.13, Aeschines the orator 2.99 στρωματόδεσμον “a bag for holding bedding”
- Plato, Theaet. 175e (where a philosopher may be ignorant of manual work like filling the stromatodesmon or preparing side dishes)
- Plutarch, Lycurgus, 16.7 on the beds of Spartiate boys
- Mats in graves at Uruk …
… in progress …
