[503] See Part First, [Chapters XII.] and [XIII.]
Vossius also quotes the authority of Jerome and Eucherius to prove the great tenacity of Byssus. But, if Byssus were cotton, it certainly would not have been celebrated on that account.
The arguments of Dr. J. R. Forster on the other side of the question will now be considered. See his Liber Singularis de Bysso Antiquorum, Lon. 1776, p. 11. 50.
I. His first argument is as follows. Julius Pollux says (l. vii. c. 17.), that Βύσσος was “a kind of flax among the Indians.” The Jewish rabbis indeed all explain the Hebrew שש (Shesh), which in the Septuagint is always translated Βύσσος, as signifying flax. But they use the term for flax in so loose and general a way, that they may very properly be supposed to have included cotton under it. In the same general sense we must suppose λίνον to be used by Julius Pollux; and it is clear, that he must have meant cotton, because cotton grows abundantly in India, whereas flax was never known to grow in India at all.
In proof of this last assertion Forster refers to Osbeck’s Journal, vol i. p. 383. He also appeals to a passage of Philostratus (Vita Apollonii, l. ii. c. 20. p. 70, 71.), which has been quoted in Part Third, p. 328., where that author certainly applies the term in question to the cotton of India.
An answer to this argument, so far as it depends on the testimony of Julius Pollux, was furnished by Olaus Celsius in his Hierobotanicon, published in 1747, a work which Forster had better have consulted, when he was writing a treatise expressly intended to ascertain the meaning of one of the botanical terms employed in the Scriptures. The learned and accurate Swede gives on good authority an emendation of the text of Pollux, which entirely destroys the argument founded upon it by Forster and those who agree with him. According to this reading Pollux only asserts that Βύσσος is a kind of flax, without adding that it grew among the Indians[504]. In a separate Appendix (E.), will be examined distinctly and fully the critical evidence for the correct state of the passages of Pollux, which it may be found necessary to cite. Pollux, in asserting that Byssus was a kind of flax, coincides with all the other witnesses who have been produced.
[504] Celsii Hierobot. vol. ii. p. 171.
Forster is also exceedingly incorrect in his mode of reasoning upon the passage of Pollux, supposing it to be accurate and genuine. He argues, that Pollux must have meant cotton by “a kind of flax among the Indians,” because real flax does not grow in India at all; “In Indiâ verò linum non erat, nec quidem nostrâ ætate linum reperitur in Indiâ, quod jam Osbeckius in Itinerario ostendit, p. 383. vol. i. edit. Anglicæ.” The “English edition” of Osbeck’s Voyage is a translation from the German by Forster himself. In the page referred to we find the following passage relative to flax, and no other:—“Flax is so rare a commodity in the East, that many have judged with great probability that the fine linen of the rich man, Luke xvi. 19, was no more than our common linen.” This sentence implies that flax grew in the East, though rarely. Whether it grew in India, Osbeck does not inform us. Dr. Wallich, who travelled in India, states that flax grows in India, and that he remembered having seen there a whole field blue with its flowers. It is cultivated principally for its seed, from which oil is extracted, the stalks being thrown aside as useless.
With respect to the passage from Philostratus, it is admitted, that he uses Βύσσος to denote cotton. Besides its proper and original sense, this word was occasionally used, as λίνον, ὀθόνη, Sindon, Carbasus, and many others were, in a looser and more general application. But the use of the term in this manner by a single writer, or even, if they could be produced, by several writers of so late an age as Philostratus, would be of little weight in opposition to the evidence, which has been brought forward to prove, that Βύσσος properly meant flax only.
II. Forster produces a passage from the Eliaca of Pausanias[505] from which he argues, that βύσσος was not flax, because Pausanias here distinguishes it from flax as well as from hemp.