Museum of Antiquity: A Description of Ancient LifeYaggy, L. W. (Levi W.)
History
Museum of Antiquity: A Description of Ancient Life
Yaggy, L. W. (Levi W.)
Civilization, Ancient; Classical antiquities
Egyptian tables were round, square, or oblong; the former were
generally used during their repasts, and consisted of a circular flat
summit, supported like the _monopodium_ of the Romans, on a single
shaft, or leg, in the centre, or by the figure of a man, intended to
represent a captive. Large tables had usually three or four legs, but
some were made with solid sides; and though generally of wood, many
were of metal or stone; and they varied in size, according to the
purposes for which they were intended.
Of the furniture of their bed-rooms we know little or nothing; but
that they universally employed the wooden pillow above alluded to is
evident, though Porphyry would lead us to suppose its use was confined
to the priests, when, in noticing their mode of life, he mentions a
half cylinder of well polished wood "sufficing to support their head,"
as an instance of their simplicity and self-denial. For the rich they
were made of Oriental alabaster, with an elegant grooved or fluted
shaft, ornamented with hieroglyphics, carved in intaglio, of sycamore,
tamarisk, and other woods of the country; the poor classes being
contented with a cheaper sort, of pottery or stone. Porphyry mentions
a kind of wicker bedstead of _palm branches_, hence called _bais_,
evidently the species of framework called _kaffass_, still employed by
the modern Egyptians as a support to the _divans_ of sitting rooms,
and to their beds. Wooden, and perhaps also bronze, bedsteads (like
the iron one of Og, King of Bashan), were used by the wealthier
classes of the ancient Egyptians; and it is at least probable that the
couches they slept upon were as elegant as those on which their bodies
reposed after death; and the more so, as these last, in their general
style, are very similar to the furniture of the sitting-room.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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