satirizes a rich man of mean extraction, who nevertheless made lofty pretensions to nobility of birth, pretending to be descended from Mars, Romulus, and Remus, and who therefore caused their images to be embossed upon his plate and woven in a silken shawl.—Epig. 26.
In the following line, he alludes to the production of silk in the usual terms:
Vellera depectit nemoralia vestifluus Ser.
Idyll. 12.
The Ser remote, in flowing garments drest,
Combs down the fleeces, which the trees invest.
QUINTUS AUR SYMMACHUS.
This distinguished officer, in a letter to the Consul Stilicho, apologizes in the following terms for his delay in sending a contribution of Holoseric pieces, that is, webs wholly made of silk, to the public exhibitions.
Others have deferred supplying the water for the theatre and the Holoseric pieces, so that I have examples in my favor.—Epist. l. iv. 8.
In a letter to Magnillus (l. v. 20.) he speaks of Subseric pieces, webs made only in part of silk, as presents;