Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/427

 of Charlemagne (c. 23.) shows, that during several succeeding centuries the Franks wore linen for their under garments.

Vestitu patrio, hoc est Francisco utebatur: ad corpus camiseam lineam, et feminalibus lineis induebatur: deinde tunicam, quæ limbo serico ambiebatur, et tibialia Sago Veneto amictus. In festivitatibus veste auro textâ, et calceamentis gemmatis, et fibulâ, aureâ sagum astringente, diademate quoque ex auro et gemmis ornatus incedebat. Aliis autem diebus habitus ejus parum a communi et plebeio abhorrebat.

Charles drest after the manner of his countrymen, the Franks. Next to the skin he wore a shirt and drawers of linen: over these a tunic bordered with silk, and breeches. His outer garment was the sagum, manufactured by the Veneti. On occasion of festivals he wore a garment interwoven with gold, shoes adorned with gems, a golden fibula to fasten his sagum, and a diadem of gold and gems On other days his dress differed little from that of the common people. The Veneti here mentioned were, no doubt, the people who lived in the country near Vannes in Britany. We have formerly seen (Part Second, pp. 282 and 283. Chapter III.), that the Sagum was the principal article of dress manufactured in the north of Gaul. According to Paulus Diaconus, as quoted in the notes on this passage of Eginhart, the Lombards and the Anglo-Saxons used principally linen garments. Linen, which appears to have been originally characteristic of the Egyptian and Germanic nations, came by degrees into more and more general use among the Greeks and Romans, and was employed not only for articles of dress, especially those worn by women, and for sheets to lie upon, but also for table-covers and for napkins to wipe the hands, an application of them which was the more necessary on account of the want of knives, forks, and spoons. Also those who waited at table, were girt with towels. At the baths persons used towels to dry themselves. A man wore a similar piece of cloth under the hands of the tonsor. Plutarch (On Garrulity) tells the following anecdote of Archelaus. When a loquacious hair-dresser was throwing the [Greek: ômolinon] about him in order to shear him, he asked as usual, "How shall I cut your majesty's hair?" "In