"Of lace amongst the Greeks we seem to have no evidence. Upon the well-known red and black vases are all kinds of figures clad in costumes which are bordered with ornamental patterns, but these were painted upon, woven into, or embroidered upon the fabric. They were not lace. Many centuries elapsed before a marked and elaborately ornamental character infused itself into twisted, plaited, or looped thread-work. During such a period the fashion of ornamenting borders of costumes and hangings existed, and underwent a few phases, as, for instance, in the Elgin marbles, where crimped {3}edges appear along the flowing Grecian dresses." Embroidered garments, cloaks, veils and cauls, and networks of gold are frequently mentioned in Homer and other early authors.[8] The countries of the Euphrates were renowned in classical times for the beauty of their embroidered and painted stuffs which they manufactured.[9] Nothing has come down to us of these Babylonian times, of which Greek and Latin writers extolled the magnificence; but we may form some idea, from the statues and figures engraved on cylinders, of what the weavers and embroiderers of this ancient time were capable.[10] A fine stone in the British Museum is engraved with the figure of a Babylonian king, Merodach-Idin-Abkey, in embroidered robes, which speak of the art as practised eleven hundred years B.C.[11] Josephus writes that the veils given by Herod for the Temple were of Babylonian work ([Greek: peplos babylônios])--the women excelling, according to Apollonius, in executing designs of varied colours. The Sidonian women brought by Paris to Troy embroidered veils of such rich work that Hecuba deemed them worthy of being offered to Athene; and Lucan speaks of the Sidonian veil worn by Cleopatra at a feast in her Alexandrine palace, in honour of Cæsar.[12] Phrygia was also renowned for its needlework, and from the shores of Phrygia Asiatic and Babylonian embroideries were shipped to Greece and Italy. The _toga picta_, worked with Phrygian embroidery, was worn by Roman generals at their triumphs and by the consuls when they celebrated the games; hence embroidery itself is styled "Phrygian,"[13] {4}and the Romans knew it under no other name (_opus Phrygianum_).[14] Gold needles and other working implements have been discovered in Scandinavian tumuli. In the _London Chronicle_ of 1767 will be found a curious account of the opening of a Scandinavian barrow near Wareham, in Dorsetshire. Within the hollow trunk of an oak were discovered many bones wrapped in a covering of deerskins neatly sewn together. There were also the remains of a piece of gold lace, four inches long and two and a half broad. This lace was black and much decayed, of the old lozenge pattern,[15] that most ancient and universal of all designs, again found depicted on the coats of ancient Danes, where the borders are edged with an open or net-work of the same pattern. [Illustration: Fig. 1. GOLD LACE FOUND IN A BARROW.]