The term Σινδών (Sindon), was used to denote linen cloth still more extensively than ὀθόνη, inasmuch as it occurs both in Greek and Latin authors[490]. According to Julius Pollux this also was a word of Egyptian origin, and Coptic scholars inform us that it is found in the modern Shento, which has the same signification[491].
[490] E. g. Martial.
[491] Jablonski, ubi supra, p. CCLXXIV.
Serapion was called Sindonites, because he always wore linen (Palladii Hist. Lausiaca, p. 172). He was an Egyptian, and retained the custom of his native country.
Although Σινδών originally denoted linen, we find it applied, like Ὀθόνη, to cotton cloth likewise; and although both of these terms probably denoted at first those linen cloths only, and especially the finer kinds of them, which were made in Egypt, yet as the manufacture of linen extends itself into other countries, and the exports of India were added to those of Egypt, all varieties either of linen or cotton cloth, wherever woven, were designated by the Egyptian names Ὀθόνη and Σινδών.
Another term, which is probably of Egyptian origin, and therefore requires explanation here, is the term Βύσσος or Byssus. Vossius (Etymol. L. Lat. v. Byssus) thinks it was, as Pollux and Isidore assert, a fine, white, soft flax, and that the cloth made from it was like the modern cambric: “Similis fuisse videtur lino isti, quod vulgo Cameracense appellamus.” Celsius, in his Hierobotanicon (vol. ii. p. 173.), gives the same explanation. This was indeed the general opinion of learned men, until J. R. Forster advanced the position, that Byssus was cotton. A careful examination of the question confirms the correctness of the old opinions, and for the following reasons.
I. The earliest author, who uses the term, is Æschylus. He represents Antigone wearing a shawl or sheet of fine flax[492]. In the Bacchæ of Euripides (l. 776.) the same garment, which was distinctive of the female sex, is introduced under the same denomination. We cannot suppose, that dramatic writers would mention in plays addressed to a general audience clothing of any material with which they were not familiarly acquainted. But the Greeks in the time of Æschylus and Euripides knew little or nothing of cotton. They had, however, been long supplied with fine linen from Egypt and Phœnice; and the βύσσινον πέπλωμα of Antigone is the same article of female attire with the ἀργενναὶ ὀθόναι of Helen, described by Homer. Indeed Æschylus himself in two other passages calls the same garment linen. In the Coephoræ (l. 25, 26.) the expressions, Λινόφθοροι δ’ ὑφασμάτων λακίδες and Πρόστερνοι στολμοὶ πέπλων, describe the rents, expressive of sorrow, which were made in the linen veil or shawl (πέπλος) of an Oriental woman. In the Supplices (l. 120.) the leader of the chorus says, she often tears her linen, or her Sidonian veil.
[492] Septem contra Thebas, l. 1041. See also Persæ, l. 129.
II. The next author in point of time, and one of the first in point of importance, is Herodotus. In his account of the mode of making mummies, he says (l. ii. c. 86.) the embalmed body was enveloped in cotton. But the fillets or bandages of the mummies are proved by microscopic observations to be universally linen; at least all the specimens have been found to be linen, which have been submitted to this, the only decisive test.
III. Herodotus also states (vii. 181.), that a man, wounded in an engagement, had his torn limbs bound σινδόνος βυσσίνης τελαμῶσι. Now, supposing that the persons concerned had their choice between linen and cotton, there can be no doubt that they would choose linen as most suitable for such a purpose. Cotton, when applied to wounds, irritates them. Julius Pollux mentions (l. iv. c. 20. 181.; l. vii. c. 16. and 25. 72.) these bandages as used in surgery. The same fillets, which were used to swathe dead bodies, were also adapted for surgical purposes. Hence a Greek Epigram (Brunck, An. iii. 169.) represents a surgeon and an undertaker AS LEAGUING TO ASSIST EACH OTHER IN BUSINESS. The undertaker supplies the surgeon with bandages stolen from the dead bodies, and the surgeon in return sends his patients to the undertaker!