s; for the silk worm was deemed by the Greeks and Romans so
exclusively and pre-eminently the attribute of the Sinae, that from this
very circumstance, they were denominated seres, or silk worms, by the
ancients.

The next authors who mention silk are Virgil, and Dionysius the geographer;
Virgil supposed the Seres to card their silk from leaves,--_Velleraque ut
foliis depectunt tentuia Seres_.--Dionysius, who was sent by Augustus to
draw up an account of the Oriental regions, says, that rich and valuable
garments were manufactured by the Seres from threads, finer than those of
the spider, which they combed from flowers.

It is not exactly known at what period silk garments were first worn at
Rome: Lipsius, in his notes on Tacitius, says, in the reign of Julius
Csesar. In the beginning of the reign of Tiberius, a law was made, that no
man should dishonor himself by wearing a silken garment. We have already
stated the opinion entertained by Pliny respecting the native country of
the silk worm; this author condemns in forcible, though affected language,
the thirst of gain, which explored the remotest parts of the earth for the
purpose of exposing to the public eye naked draperies and transparent
matrons. In his time, slight silks, flowered, seem to have been introduced
into religious ceremonies, as he describes crowns, in honour of the
deities, of various colours, and highly perfumed, made of silk. The next
author who mentions silk is Pausanias; he says, the thread from which the
Seres form their web is not from any kind of bark, but is obtained in a
different way; they have in their country a spinning insect, which the
Greeks call seer. He supposes that the insect lived five years, and fed on
green haulm: by the last particular, it is not improbable he meant the
leaves of the mulberry tree. For 200 years after the age of Pliny, the use
of silk was confined to the female sex, till the richer citizens, both of
the capital and the provinces, followed the example of Heliogabalus, the
first man, who, according to Lampridius, wore _holosericum_ that is, a
garment which was all of silk. From this expression, however, it is
evident, that previous to this period the male inhabitants of Rome had been
in the habit of wearing garments made of silk mixed with linen or woollen.

Hitherto there is no intimation in ancient authors of the price of silk at
Rome; in the time of Aurelian, however, that is towards the end of the
third centur