[28] Book ii. ch. 3. p. 307.
As contemporary with the authors last quoted, Dyonisius and Strabo, we may here mention the law passed by the Roman Senate early in the reign of Tiberius, “Ne vestis Serica viros fœdaret.” Taciti Annales, ii. 33. Dion. Cass. l. 57. p. 860. Reim. Suidas in v.Τιβέριος[29]. Silk was to be worn by women only.
[29] Dio Cassius (l. 43. p. 358. Rheim.) mentions as a report, that Julius Cæsar employed silk curtains (παραπετάσματα Σηρικὰ) to add to the splendor of his triumph.
The next emperor Caligula had silk curtains to his throne (Dion. Cass. l. 59. p. 915. Reim.), and he wore silk as part of his dress, when he appeared in public. Dio Cassius particularly mentions, that, when he was celebrating a kind of triumph at Puteoli, he put on what he alleged to be the thorax of Alexander, and over that a silken chlamys, dyed with the murex, and adorned with gold and precious stones. On the following day he wore a tunic interwoven with gold[30]. The use of shawls and tunics of silk was, however, except in the case of the extravagances of a Caligula, still confined to the female sex. Under the earlier emperors it is probable, that silk was obtained in considerable quantities for the wardrobe of the empress, where it was preserved from one reign to another, until in the year 176 Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, the philosopher, in consequence of the exhausted state of his treasury, sold by public auction in the Forum of Trajan the imperial ornaments and jewels together with the golden and silken robes of the Empress[31].
[30] In describing the effeminate dress of the emperor Caligula, Suetonius tells us (cap. 52), that he often went into public, wearing bracelets and long sleeves, and sometimes in a garment of silk and a cyclas.
[31] Jul. Capitol. c. xvii. p. 65. Bip.
FIRST CENTURY.
SENECA, THE PHILOSOPHER.
Posse nos vestitos esse sine commercio Serum.—Epist. 91.
We may clothe ourselves without any commerce with the Seres.