Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 4.djvu/311

 ENCiLlSlI MEDIEVAL EMBROIDERY. 287 But the usage of embroidered vestments by royal person- ages must be regarded as infinitely earlier than the period just referred to, since it was the first kind of costly attire with which we are acquainted. It was adopted from remote anti- quity ; nothing could be more suitable for monarchs, nor any kind of apparel more beautiful, being the means of uniting together the richest gifts of nature and the choicest produc- tions of art. The jIuse of Greece sung of these brilliant in- ventions in the mythic ages of the Trojan war ; heroes of the Augustan era returned home from conquest in such glit- tering raiment, that it required the powers of inspiration to describe it : and when the Provencal rhymers, Avho caught the last echo of Latin poetry, wished to deck loveliness in its richest dress they clothed it in embroidered robes. It cannot have escaped the recollection of the classical reader how Homer makes Penelope throw over Ulysses, before his departure for Ilium, an upper garment embroidered in gold, on which was imaged the actions of the chase. We behold the bard picturing the dog holding the spotted fawn with his fore feet intent upon his capture, Avhilst it struggles and pants for freedom ; a subject so vividly expressed by the needle of the Ithacensian housewife that he speaks of the work itself as the universal admiration of beholders. The concurrent voice of antiquity dwells with rapture on the prevalent use of golden tissues. We hear for instance of those which were woven by and adorned the persons of Dido and Andromache ; of spoils of this precious cloth being carried away as the richest treasm*e in the pillage of Persepolis ; of the robe and pavilion of Arsace, formed of gold and purple ; of the am"eate veils hanging over the nuptial guests of Alex- ander, and of the sumptuous decorations lining the tents of Ptolemy Philadelphus. Nor was this luxury limited either to personal embellishment, or to the moveables of the living. Tunics interwoven with the costly thread were cast over the images of their deities ; they overspread the colossal statue of liacclms andNyssa at Alexandria, whilst the peplum of Minerva, embroidered by virgins so as to represent her attri- butes, was annually carried in solemn procession at the great Panathenaic festival at Athens, and carefully laid up in the temple of the goddess. On the throne and the sarcophagus were to be seen these emblems of magnificence ; the idols of heathenism, no less than the tombs of reputed saints, rivalled