Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/466

 the colder regions of Asia, scarlet or purple felt (such as that lately re-invented at Leeds, in England), was used by the Babylonish decorators for the drapery of the funeral pile, when Alexander celebrated the splendid obsequies of Hephæstion: for so we must understand the expression [Greek: phoinikides pilêtai (Diod. Sic. xvii. 115. p. 251, Wess.). Xenophon (Cycrop. v. 5. § 7.) mentions the use of felt manufactured in Media, ''as a covering for chairs and couches''. The Medes also used bags and sacks of felt (Athenæus, 1. xii. p. 540 c. Casaub.).

The process, by which wool is converted into felt, was called by the Greeks [Greek: pilêsis] (Plato de Leg. 1. viii. p. 115. ed. Bekker), literally a compression, from [Greek: pileô], to compress. The ancient Greek scholion on the passage of Plato here referred to thus explains the term: [Greek: Pilêseôs; tês dia tês tôn eriôn pyknôseôs ginomenês esthêtos], i. e. "cloth made by the thickening of wool." With this definition of felt agrees the following description of a [Greek: petasos] in a Greek epigram, which records the dedication of it to Mercury:—

[Greek: Soi ton pilêthenta di' enxanton trichos amnou, Herma, Kallitelês ekremase petason.]

Brunck, Anal. ii. 41.

The art of felting was called [Greek: hê pilêtikê], (Plato, Polit. ii. 2. p. 296, ed. Bekker). According to the ancient Greek and Latin glossaries, and to Julius Pollux (vii. 30), a felt-maker, or hatter, was [Greek: pilopoios] or [Greek: pilôtopoios], in Latin coactiliarius. From [Greek: pilos] (dim. [Greek: pilion], second dim. [pilidion]), the proper term for felt in general, derived from the root of [Greek: pileô], came the verb [Greek: piloô], signifying to felt, or to make felt, and from this latter verb was formed the ancient participle [Greek: pilôtos], felted, which again gave origin to [Greek: pilôtopoios].

It may be observed, that our English word felt is evidently a participle or a derivative, and that its verb or root appears to be the same with the root of [Greek: pileô].

The Latin cogo, which was used, like the Greek [Greek: pileô], to de-*, Stobæi Eclog. i. 27. p. 550, ed. Heeren); and that the air was emitted from the earth by its compression ([Greek: pilêsis], i. 23. p. 484).]