The History of Silk, Cotton, Linen, Wool, and Other Fibrous Substances;: Including Observations on Spinning, Dyeing, and Weaving.Gilroy, Clinton G.
History
The History of Silk, Cotton, Linen, Wool, and Other Fibrous Substances;: Including Observations on Spinning, Dyeing, and Weaving.
Gilroy, Clinton G.
History, Ancient; Textile fabrics -- History
When the gale favors, give the wind your sails.
Sed non, quo dederas a litore carbasa, vento
Utendum, medio cum potiare freto.--_Art. Am._ ii. 357.
The wind to which you give your sails on shore,
In the mid ocean will assist no more.
Dumque parant torto subducere carbasa lino.--_Fast._ iii. 587.
They now with twisted ropes let down the sails.
In all these passages Ovid uses _carbasa_ in the improper sense: it was
an easy transition from the idea of a cotton awning, with which the
Romans had become familiar, to apply the term to the sail of a ship. To
these examples we may add the following:
Et sequitur curvus fugienta carbasa delphin.
_Seneca, Œd._ ii. _prope fin._
The dolphin curved pursues the flying sails.
Strictaque pendentes deducunt carbasa nautæ.--_Lucan_, ii. 697.
The mariners confine the sails with cords,
And, clinging to the mast, they take them down.
Recto deprendit carbasa malo. ix. 324.
The mast stands upright; he takes down the sails.
Jamque adeo egressi steterant in littore primo,
Et promota, ratis pendentibus arbore nautis,
Aptabant sensim pulsanti carbasa vento.
_Silius Italicus. Pun._ iii. 128.
They leave the port and reach the shore: aloft
They hang upon the mast, and by degrees
They fit the sails to catch the beating wind.
Festinant trepidi substringere carbasa nautæ.
_Martial_, _l._ xii. _ep._ 29.
The trembling seamen haste to reef their sails.
Primæ, carbasa ventilantis, auræ.--_Statius, Sylv._ iv. 3. 106.
Of the first gale, which breathes upon the sails.
Statius also mentions “Carbasei sinus,” the folds of cotton in the
chlamys of a Bacchanal (_Theb._ vii. 658.).
Æstivos penetrent oneraria carbasa fluctus.--_Rutilius_, i. 221.
Postquam tua carbasa vexit--Oceanus.--_Val. Flaccus_, i.
Necdum aliæ viderunt carbasa terræ.--_Ibid._
Valerius Flaccus also introduces muslin among the elegances in the
dress of a Phrygian from the river Rhyndacus.
Tenuai non illum candentis carbasa lini,
Non auro depicta chlamys, non flava galeri
Cæsaries, pictoque juvant subtemine braccæ. vi. 228.
No aid to him his chlamys white as snow,
Muslin with gold enrich’d, his yellow curls
Of artificial hair, and _figured_ pantaloons.
(See Part 1, chap. iii. p. 59.)
Also Prudentius, the Christian poet (See Part 1, chap. iii. p. 59.),
in an elaborate account of Pride, depicts her in a garment of the same
kind:
Carbasea ex humeris summo collecta coibat
Palla sinu, teretem nectens a pectore nodum.--_Psychom._ 186.
A muslin kerchief by a knot compress’d,
Pass’d o’er her shoulders, and adorn’d her breast.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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