# Development of camouflage....



## Lucky13 (Mar 26, 2013)

Who did most for the development of camouflage in WWII, uniforms etc., was it Germany, how much did get out there and how much did never leave the drawingboard?


----------



## michaelmaltby (Mar 26, 2013)

Believe the development started in France, IIRC.

Andre Mare, French cubist painter, inspired "dazzle":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/André_Mare

MM


----------



## yulzari (Mar 26, 2013)

One could point to tweed but much, much earlier.


----------



## vinnye (Mar 26, 2013)

Maybe you could point to the ghillie suits worn by British snipers in WW1 ?


----------



## stona (Mar 26, 2013)

Or just plain simple Khaki ?

Steve


----------



## michaelmaltby (Mar 26, 2013)

"... Khaki "

An Urdu word from India, IIRC

MM


----------



## stona (Mar 26, 2013)

michaelmaltby said:


> "... Khaki "
> 
> An Urdu word from India, IIRC
> 
> MM



Certainly one of the Indian languages. I've seen it variously translated as dust or soil coloured which is pretty self explanatory in terms of camouflage.

Not to be confused with Khazi (which may or may not have a Zulu derivation) which is something entirely different 

Steve


----------



## yulzari (Mar 26, 2013)

Or with the Khasi of Khalabar which out to (but doesn't) lead into the old joke about the shoemakers who provided the Khasi with his shoes and, sadly, advertised themselves with the sign 'Cobblers to the Khasi'.

But we digress.

Treading on potentially delicate ground, were the excellent Portugese regiments who operated in support of Lord Wellesley in the Peninsula War not known as 'Cacadores' and dressed in brown uniforms? Highly thought of by their British colleagues as befits Britain's oldest allies.

But still we digress from WW2.


----------



## Civettone (Jun 11, 2013)

The Germans copied it from the Italians. They were the first to mass produce camouflage fabric for clothing and tents and the likes. Called Telo Mimetico Mod. 29.


Kris


----------



## Airframes (Jun 11, 2013)

It could have been Robin Hood, with his 'cloth of Lincoln Green' ..................


----------



## N4521U (Jun 12, 2013)

Khaki....................... dusty.

When the British wore red coats in the desert and got dirty they were more difficult to see, and started making Khaki color uniforms. IIRC


----------



## yulzari (Jun 12, 2013)

Airframes said:


> It could have been Robin Hood, with his 'cloth of Lincoln Green' ..................



_Just to confirm my pedantry qualifications_: the Lincoln 'Green' was actually Lincoln 'Grain'. A red colour from Kermes insects imported possibly from Poland. The purpose in the legend was to infer the success of Robin Hood's men (that great Yorkshireman from the forest of Barnsely) by showing them dressed in the most expensive colour. This was the same reason as Cardinals wore red and the Virgin Mary's clothes were in red in the early days of european painting, until the Venetians began to import lapis lazuli blue from Afghanistan which was beautiful and even more expensive than red paint pigments.

But perhaps I digress from WW2?

Did I mention that I once had lunch with the Sheriff of Nottingham in his modest bungalow just off the ring road?


----------



## Airframes (Jun 12, 2013)

Well, well! So the cloth wasn't green at all! And all this time I thought old Robin had used his noggin, and outfitted his Combat Group .... er, band of merry men, with an early form of DPM! And they were 'merry', I suppose, due to all that mead! Merry? P*ssed as a parrot more like!


----------



## nincomp (Jun 13, 2013)

I understand that we Americans had bad luck with camouflage during WWII. If I remember correctly, some marines were issued forest camo in the pacific, but the pattern faded quickly and soon became more visible than khakis.

The Germans wore camouflage. When some American troops were issued forest camos they kept coming under friendly fire. I guess that it is better to be seen by the enemy than being killed by friends.


----------



## pattle (Jun 13, 2013)

For me the Italians were the gods of camouflage when I see the way they painted their aircraft.


----------



## nincomp (Jun 13, 2013)

pattle said:


> For me the Italians were the gods of camouflage when I see the way they painted their aircraft.


What aircraft? Oh, wait a minute. That explains why I never see anything when members post photos of Italian aircraft.


----------



## pattle (Jun 14, 2013)

nincomp said:


> What aircraft? Oh, wait a minute. That explains why I never see anything when members post photos of Italian aircraft.



Are you are having a tin bath? you must have seen pictures of camouflaged Italian aircraft before? What aircraft? Just do a google image search for sm79, mc2000, Fiat CR42 or just about any other WW2 pre-armistice Italian Aircraft and you will see that they are mostly painted in three colour camouflage schemes.


----------



## Civettone (Jun 14, 2013)

Pattle, it was a joke ... 


(not seeing aircraft because they were camouflaged)
Kris


----------



## nincomp (Jun 14, 2013)

Civettone said:


> Pattle, it was a joke ...
> 
> (not seeing aircraft because they were camouflaged)
> Kris


What he said. 
I merely intended to take your valid comment about the excellent camouflage and blow it up to a humorously absurd level - invisible aircraft. I guess it was not as humorous as I thought.

Sometimes my jokes are much funnier to me than to anyone else. Sorry, I meant no disrespect.


----------



## GrauGeist (Jun 14, 2013)

One of the earliest accounts of camouflage was Julius Caesar's scout ships, used during the Gallic Wars (about 54 b.c.), when they were painted "Venetian Blue" for scouting the British coast. The crews aboard (sailors and marines) were uniformed in the same blue-green color.


----------



## mikewint (Jun 14, 2013)

Terry, surprised you accepted that post from Yulzari: Lyncolne grene is a deep warm olive green. The dyers of Lincoln, a cloth town in the high Middle Ages, produced the cloth by dyeing it with woad (Isatis tinctoria) to give it a strong blue, then overdyeing it yellow with weld (Reseda luteola) or dyers' broom, Genista tinctoria.

A popular ballad printed in the eighteenth-century compilations Robin Hood's Garland offers an unexpected picture of Robin as he presented himself at court:

"He cloathed his men in Lincoln green
And himself in scarlet red"

This is/was Lincoln scarlet, from its imported dyestuff as Yulzari posted, was more expensive than Lincoln green. Would outlaws in the forest cloth themselves in very expensive "Scarlet" cloth?


----------



## Airframes (Jun 14, 2013)

GrauGeist said:


> One of the earliest accounts of camouflage was Julius Caesar's scout ships, used during the Gallic Wars (about 54 b.c.), when they were painted "Venetian Blue" for scouting the British coast. The crews aboard (sailors and marines) were uniformed in the same blue-green color.


They got that wrong then - it's normally dark grey around the coasts of Britain!
Thanks Mike - I _thought_ the cloth was actually green, as I remember reading about the specialist dyers of Lincoln, and the olive green cloth, and this being the only place it could be obtained. And in those days, quite a long journey to get it, too. So, the Mead-befuddled Merry Men _were_ actually camouflaged.


----------



## pattle (Jun 14, 2013)

nincomp said:


> What he said.
> I merely intended to take your valid comment about the excellent camouflage and blow it up to a humorously absurd level - invisible aircraft. I guess it was not as humorous as I thought.
> 
> Sometimes my jokes are much funnier to me than to anyone else. Sorry, I meant no disrespect.



Sorry sometimes I can be a bit slow, now I feel a bit of a knob.


----------



## nincomp (Jun 14, 2013)

pattle said:


> Sorry sometimes I can be a bit slow, now I feel a bit of a knob.



Don't worry about it. If it makes you feel better, I can guarantee that most of the people here in North Carolina (USA) will have no idea of what you meant in the above comment anyway. They will picture a door-knob then think to themselves: "What in creation does he mean by that?"


----------



## yulzari (Jun 15, 2013)

mikewint said:


> Terry, surprised you accepted that post from Yulzari: Lyncolne grene is a deep warm olive green. The dyers of Lincoln, a cloth town in the high Middle Ages, produced the cloth by dyeing it with woad (Isatis tinctoria) to give it a strong blue, then overdyeing it yellow with weld (Reseda luteola) or dyers' broom, Genista tinctoria.
> 
> A popular ballad printed in the eighteenth-century compilations Robin Hood's Garland offers an unexpected picture of Robin as he presented himself at court:
> 
> ...



Hi Mike.

In truth no one actually knows because 'Robin Hood' is a conflation of many oral traditions all hung on a probable thread of a Yorkshire bandit.

The later written tales come from a time when the Lincoln reds were superceded by cheaper reds (but the Roman Catholic church still kept the red tradition in ecclesiastical dress.)

Lincoln, indeed all european historical greens, were expensively double dyed in blue and yellow so the audience assumed the 'grane' was 'green' as it was clearly posh cloth and green seems logical. The early red reference was a plot ploy to show how successful the outlaws were.

We can see a later flaunting of wealth with cloth in the times of the Puritans; whose black cloth and white linen implied wealth as the black too had to be doubled dyed and white linen implied servants to keep it clean and the wealth to buy linen. It also allowed the rising Puritan middle classes to by pass sumptuary laws. Poor Puritans had to make do with the common grey or brown cloth and unbleached woollen shirts.

Anyway, I will close the subject there as it is a little far from WW2. 

We are both possibly right, or possibly wrong. My money is on the real outlaws wearing brown or grey but the illustrations in slightly later medieval Books of Hours (our colour 'photographs' of the Middle Ages) show peasants in some surprisingly bright colours (though I suspect the pinks are depicting faded reds) but are authentic in showing the castles as bright white as they were lime washed annually. Hence they left holes for the scaffolding pole to use. Maybe one day Hollywood will show medieval castles properly washed in white within and without with bright hangings and bright painted furniture. In those days colour meant wealth.


----------



## Civettone (Jun 15, 2013)

Nincomp, I liked your joke! 

As to Julius Caesar. As far as I know, the only source we have, is his De Bello Gallico memoirs. As such, I think we can only guess what colours he really used. 'Venetian blue' would be funny as Venice was founded centuries later  (after the destruction of Aquileia by Attila the Hun).


Kris


----------



## GrauGeist (Jun 15, 2013)

Civettone said:


> As to Julius Caesar. As far as I know, the only source we have, is his De Bello Gallico memoirs. As such, I think we can only guess what colours he really used. 'Venetian blue' would be funny as Venice was founded centuries later  (after the destruction of Aquileia by Attila the Hun).
> Kris


The "Venetian Blue" reference came from Vegetius' (Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus) 4th century military writings "Epitoma rei militaris" while trying to describe the color used by Julius Caesar's naval units during the Gallic Wars.


----------



## Airframes (Jun 15, 2013)

You sure it wasn't 'Norwegian Blue' Dave? 
Oops! Wrong sketch ... I mean thread! I'll get me coat!


----------



## GrauGeist (Jun 15, 2013)

Airframes said:


> You sure it wasn't 'Norwegian Blue' Dave?
> Oops! Wrong sketch ... I mean thread! I'll get me coat!


lmao Terry!

Pretty sure...and I seriously doubt it was Prussian Blue, either...the Romans hadn't made friends with the Teutons yet


----------



## Civettone (Jun 15, 2013)

Great!
I read Vegetius as well as Ammianus Marcellinus for my dissertation on Late Roman fortifications. I remember I had to be careful using Vegetius, because his sources were a bit dubious, while as Amm. Marc. had first-hand knowledge. Anyway, I am not going so far as to criticize Vegetius' account and give him the benefit of the doubt.
But he did not call it 'Venetian' blue, did he?

Kris


----------



## GrauGeist (Jun 15, 2013)

Civettone said:


> Great!
> I read Vegetius as well as Ammianus Marcellinus for my dissertation on Late Roman fortifications. I remember I had to be careful using Vegetius, because his sources were a bit dubious, while as Amm. Marc. had first-hand knowledge. Anyway, I am not going so far as to criticize Vegetius' account and give him the benefit of the doubt.
> But he did not call it 'Venetian' blue, did he?
> 
> Kris


I agree wih you regarding Vegetius on many accounts! Especially his military "advice", however he did become an accidental historian by preserving a great deal of information in his writings that would have been otherwise lost.

As far as the reference to "venetian blue", this was a term he used so and while not a very technical term, it is descriptive and perhaps was influenced by his travels in the area at that time.

My guess is that the term "Venetian" may not be in reference to the city, but rather the area, since the "city" was still a small community in it developing stages by the 4th century.


----------

