In our oldest inventories mention is often made of a “panus Tartaricus” or Tartary cloth, which was, if not always, at least often purple. Asia, especially in its eastern borders, became famous for the fine textiles it wove out of cotton, and dyed in every colour. Cities got for themselves a reputation for some especial excellence in their looms, and as Mosul had the name of Muslin from that place given to the fine and delicate cotton webs it wrought, so the term of buckram for another sort of cotton textile came from the city of Bokhara in Tartary where this cloth was made. All along the middle ages buckram was much esteemed for being costly and very fine, and consequently fit for use in church vestments, and for secular personal wear. John Grandison, consecrated bishop of Exeter, A.D. 1327, gave to his cathedral flags of white and red buckram;[270] and among the five very rich veils for covering the moveable lectern in that church, three were lined with blue “bokeram.”[271] As late as the beginning of the sixteenth century this stuff was held good enough for lining to a black velvet gown for a queen, Elizabeth of York.[272] The coarse thick fabric which now goes by the name was anything but the olden production known as “bokeram.” [270] Ib. p. 319. [271] Ib. p. 329. [272] Her Privy Purse Expenses, ed. Nicolas, p. 22, &c. _Burdalisaunder_, _Bordalisaunder_, _Bourde de Elisandre_, with other varieties in spelling, is a term often to be met with in old wills and church inventories. In the year 1327 Exeter had a chasuble of Bourde de Elisandre of divers colours.[273] It was wide enough for half a piece to form the adornment of a high altar.[274] The difficulty of understanding what this textile was will vanish when we remember that in Arabic “bord” to this day means a striped cloth; and we know, both from travellers and the importation of the textile itself, that many tribes in North and Eastern Africa weave stuffs for personal wear of a pattern consisting of white and black longitudinal stripes. St. Augustin too, living in North Africa near the modern Algiers, speaks of a stuff for clothing called “burda,” in the end of the fourth and beginning of the fifth century. Burdalisaunder was a silken web in different coloured stripes, and specimens of this, at one time known as “stragulata” may be found here at pp. 21, 27, 33, 56, 57, 161, 225, 226, &c. Though made in so many places round the Mediterranean, this silk took its name, at least in England, from Alexandria, because it was to be had in that Egyptian city, always celebrated for its silks, either better made or at a much lower price than elsewhere. In all likelihood the curtains for the tabernacle, as well as the girdles for Aaron and his sons, of fine linen and violet and purple, and scarlet twice dyed, were wrought with this very pattern, so that in the “stragulata” or “burd Aliscaunder” we behold the oldest known design for any textile. [273] Oliver, p. 312.