M. Gabriel Peignot, in his "Essai sur l'Histoire da Parchemin et du Vélin," Paris, 1812, and in his paper on the same subject in "Le Moyen Age et la Renaissance," vol. ii. Paris, 1849, produces evidence of the use of parchment for writing upon anterior to the age of Eumenes; and consequently limits his interpretation of Pliny's words, "Varro membranas Pergami tradidit repertas," to an assertion of the discovery of improved processes by which parchment was rendered more available for writing upon than it had been previous to the accession of Eumenes.
A good representation of a scrinium and scapi, from a painting in the "Casa Falkener," described in the "Museum of Classical Antiquities," vol. ii. p. 54, is given in one of the cubicula of the Pompeian Court at Sydenham.
See Gell's "Pompeiana" Appendix; and the "Memoir of the Canonico Iorio."
"Let those who will have old books written in gold and silver on purple parchment, or, as they are commonly called, in uncial letters,—rather ponderous loads than books,—so long as they permit me and mine to have poor copies, and rather correct than beautiful books."
P. 113. Ingram, Cooke, & Co., London, 1853.