I have satisfied myself, that both cotton and linen have been employed in the preparation of our mummy, although Herodotus mentions only cotton (byssus) as the material used for the purpose. Most mummies have been described as wholly enveloped in linen cloth, and some persons are disposed to doubt the existence of cotton cloth in any, not excepting in the one now under consideration.
But with respect to the last point, a simple experiment has, I think, set the question at rest. If the surface of old linen, and of old cotton cloth be rubbed briskly and for some minutes with a rounded piece of glass or ivory, after being washed and freed from all extraneous matter, the former will be found to have acquired considerable lustre; while the latter will present no other difference than that of having the threads flattened by the operation. By means of this test I selected several pieces of cotton cloth from among the many bandages of our mummy, which I submitted to the inspection of an experienced manufacturer, who declared them to be of that material.
Besides the appeal to the senses of “an experienced manufacturer,” Dr. Granville here proposes a new test, that of rubbing in the manner described. But, although cotton cloth in all circumstances has less lustre than linen, still this cannot be considered a satisfactory criterion.
The ingenious John Howell of Edinburgh[479] paid some attention to this question, having a few years since obtained and opened a valuable mummy. He and the friends, whom he consulted, and who were weavers and other persons of practical experience, most of them thought that the cloth was altogether linen: some however thought that certain specimens of it were cotton.
[479] Author of an Essay on the War Galleys of the Ancients, Edinburgh 1826, 8vo.
This curious and important question was at length decisively settled by means of microscopic observations instituted by James Thomson, Esq. F. R. S. of Clitheroe, one of the most observant and experienced cotton-manufacturers in Great Britain. He obtained about 400 specimens of mummy cloth, and employed Mr. Bauer of Kew to examine them with his microscopes. By the same method the structure and appearance of the ultimate fibres of modern cotton and flax were ascertained; and were found to be so distinct that there was no difficulty in deciding upon the ancient specimens, and it was also found that they were universally linen. About twelve years after Mr. Thomson had commenced his researches he published the results of them in the Philosophical Magazine[480], and he has accompanied them with a Plate exhibiting the obvious difference between the two classes of objects. The ultimate fibre of cotton is a transparent tube without joints, flattened so that its inward surfaces are in contact along its axis, and also twisted spirally round its axis (See A. [Plate VI.]): that of flax is a transparent tube jointed like a cane, and not flattened nor spirally twisted (See B. [Plate VI.]). To show the difference two specimens of the fibres of cotton, and two of the fibres of mummy cloth are exhibited, all of the specimens being one hundredth of an inch long, and magnified 400 times in each dimension. Any person, even with a microscope of moderate power, may discern the difference between the two kinds of fibres, though not so minutely and exactly as in the figures of Mr. Bauer.
[480] Third Series, vol. v. No. 29, November 1834.
The difference, here pointed out, will explain why linen has greater lustre than cotton: it is no doubt because in linen the lucid surfaces are much larger. The same circumstance may also explain the different effect of linen and cotton upon the health and feelings of those who wear them (See Part Third, [Chap. I.]). Every linen thread presents only the sides of cylinders: that of cotton, on the other hand, is surrounded by an innumerable multitude of exceedingly minute edges.
Mr. Pettigrew, in his “History of Egyptian Mummies” (London 1834, p. 95.), expresses the opinion that the bandages are principally of cotton, though occasionally of linen. He has since arrived at the conclusion that they are all of linen: and his opinion appears to be established on the following evidence, which he gives in a note to the above mentioned work (p. 91.).
Dr. Ure has been so good as to make known to me that which I conceive to be the most satisfactory test of the absolute nature of flax and cotton, and in the course of his microscopic researches on the structure of textile fibres he has succeeded in determining their distinctive characters. From a most precise and accurate examination of these substances he has been able to draw the following statement:—The filaments of flax have a glassy lustre when viewed by day-light in a good microscope, and a cylindrical form, which is very rarely flattened. Their diameter is about the two-thousandth part of an inch. They break transversely with a smooth surface, like a tube of glass cut with a file. A line of light distinguishes their axis, with a deep shading on one side only, or on both sides, according to the direction in which the incident rays fall on the filaments.