Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/340

 military engines, and to L. v. Dial. ix. for passages from Thucydides, Arrian, Ammianus, Suidas, Vegetius, Curtius, and others, proving, that the besieged in cities hung Cilicia over their towers and walls to obviate the force of the various weapons hurled against them, and especially of the arrows, which carried fire.

From Exodus we learn, that the Israelites in the wilderness among their contributions to the Tabernacle gave goats'-hair, and that it was spun by women. The spun goats'-hair was probably used in part to make cords for the tent; but part of it at least was woven into the large pieces, called in the Septuagint "curtains of goats'-hair." Such curtains, or Saga, of spun goats'-hair seem to have been commonly used for the covering of tents.

Cloths of the same kind were used for rubbing horses. The term for goats*-hair cloth in Hebrew, Chaldee, and Syraic, is or, i. e. , or , translated [Greek: SAKKOS] in the Septuagint, and in the Vulgate version of the Scriptures. The Latin, appears to have had the same origin. In English we have Sack and Shag, scarcely differing from the oriental and ancient terms either in sound or sense.