The earliest mention of flax by any author occurs in the account of the plague of hail, which devastated Lower Egypt, Ex. ix. 31. The Hebrew term for flax in this and various other passages of the old Testament is פשתה ; the corresponding word in the Chaldee, Syriac, and Arabic versions is כתנא Λίνον, LXX. Linum, Jerome.
In Isaiah xix. 9, according to King James’s Translators and Bishop Lowth, mention is made of those that “work in fine flax,” and which was one of the chief employments of the Egyptians. According to Herodotus (ii. 37, 81.) the Egyptians universally wore linen shirts, which were fringed at the bottom. The fringe consisted of the thrums, or ends of the webs. Thrums used for this purpose may be seen in the cloths which are found in Egyptian mummies.
PLATE VI
Egyptian flax-gathering.
Besides the linen shirt the priests wore an upper garment of linen, more especially when they officiated in the temples. This garment was probably of the exact form of a modern linen sheet. The distinction between the shirt and the sheet worn over it, as well as the reason why linen was used for all sacred purposes, is clearly expressed in the two following passages from Apuleius and Jerome.
Etiamnè cuiquam mirum videri potest, cui sit ulla memoria religionis, hominem tot mysteriis Deûm conscium, quædam sacrorum crepundia domi adversare, atque ea lineo texto involvere, quod purissimum est rebus divinis velamentum? Quippe lana, segnissimi corporis excrementum, pecori detracta, jam inde Orphei et Pythagoræ scitis, profanus vestitus est. Sed enim mundissima lini seges, inter optimas fruges terrâ exorta, non modò indutui et amictui sanctissimis Ægyptiorum sacerdotibus, sed opertui quoque in rebus sacris usurpatur.
Apuleii Apolog. p. 64. ed. Pricæi.
Can any one impressed with a sense of religion wonder, that a man who has been made acquainted with so many mysteries of the gods, should keep at home certain sacred emblems and wrap them in a linen cloth, the purest covering for divine objects? For wool, the excretion of a sluggish body, taken from sheep, was deemed a profane attire even according to the early tenets of Orpheus and Pythagoras. But flax, that cleanest and best production of the field, is used, not only for the inner and outer clothing of the most holy priests of the Egyptians, but also for covering sacred objects.—Yates’s Translation.
Indutus was the putting on of the inner, amictus of the outer garment.