NEMESIANUS.
In thy scarf’s woof much sportive gold display.—Cyneg. 91.
The poet is addressing Diana and describing her attire.
AUSONIUS.
Weave flexile gold within thy shawls, O Greece[121].
This is the first passage since the time of Homer, which mentions Greece as concerned in weaving with gold. But Ausonius probably alluded to the Greeks of Asia Minor, as, besides the evidence produced from Basil, we have seen that Pergamus was one of the most noted places for these productions, which were on that account called “Attalicæ vestes[122].”
When Ausonius was appointed Consul at Rome A. D. 379, his friend and former pupil, the Emperor Gratian, sent him as a present a toga in which was inserted a figure of Constantius II., wrought in gold.—Ausonii Gratiarum Actio, § 53.
[121] Epigram 37.
[122] “I find evidence that kings wore the striped toga; that figured cloths were in use even in the days of Homer; and that these gave rise to the triumphal. To produce this effect with the needle was the invention of the Phrygians, on which account cloths so embroidered have been called Phrygionic. In the same part of Asia king Attalus discovered the art of inserting a woof of gold(?); from which circumstance the Attalic cloths received their name(?). Babylon first obtained celebrity by its method of diversifying the picture with different colors, and gave its name to textures of this description. But to weave with a great number of leashes, so as to produce the cloths called polymita (the polymita were damask cloths), was first taught in Alexandria; to divide by squares (plaids) in Gaul. Metellus Scipio brought it as an accusation against Cato, that even in his time Babylonian coverlets for triclinia were sold for 800,000 sesterces (about $30,000), although the emperor Nero lately gave for them no less than 4,000,000 sesterces (about $150,000). The prætextæ of Servius Tullius, covering the statue of Fortune which he dedicated, remained until the death of Sejanus, and it is wonderful that they had neither decayed of themselves nor been injured by moths during the space of 560 years.”—Plin. H. N. viii. 64. (See [Appendix A].)