61 



approaching, he took the further precaution of delivering to the Levites, 

 who carried the Ark, the books wherein he had been employed in 

 copying these supplementary " Words and Judgments of the Lord. '* 

 In all probability, this book consisted of a scroll or scrolls of leather, 

 which material is used by the Hebrews to this day for the same purpose. 

 Lead and copper (or brass) were sometimes employed, in these remote 

 ages of the world, for the preservation of documents, though it is clear 

 that the use of these metals for such objects must have been extremely 

 limited. The Roman laws of the twelve tables were engraven on brass. 

 Pliny informs us that the first writing of the Egyptians was upon palm- 

 leaves, which are still partially employed among Eastern nations. But 

 the material which was very early and very extensively brought into use 

 among the people of Asia and the countries bordering upon the Mediter- 

 , ranean, was the Papyrus. This was manufactured from the inner rind 

 of the plant of that name, called also by the Egyptians (iv^Xoa — whence 

 are derived the terms paper and Bibk. The process of the manufacture 

 was as follows : — The outer bark being stripped off, the inner coats were 

 separated by a sharp instrument. These pellicles were then laid upon 

 a table, two or more over each other transversely, were glued together 

 with paste or with the slimy water of the Nile, pressed, and made 

 smooth with a glass or ivory roller. After a number of sheets had been 

 thus prepared, ten or twenty of them were pasted together endways, and 

 rolled upon a staff with umbilici or bosses at the extremities. Hence 

 we derive the word vohune. The writing was generally executed in the 

 direction of the length of the roll, and in successive columns, divided by 

 blank spaces. The first sheet of the manuscript — i. e. the end to the 

 left hand — was frequently composed of parchment or other skin, which 

 not only furnished a strong and unyielding cover when it was rolled up, 

 but was capable of receiving some extensive decoration. A portrait of 

 the author was occasionally inserted. Sometimes both ends of the roll 

 were secured and ornamented in this manner. A label was fastened at 

 one end, upon which the title of the work was given. Half a dozen or 

 a dozen of these rolls were frequently placed in a scriniumf or ark 

 (generally made round,) for taking upon a journey, ka. One of these 

 scrinea was found at Herculaneum, decorated with the busts of Demos- 

 thenes, Epicurus, and other worthies ; but it crumbled into dust on 

 exposure to the atmosphere. In the Florentine Museum is an antient 

 statue of a scriniarius, or master of the rolls, with his circular scrinium 



* Exodasch. xxiv., and Deat ch. xxxi. Eleven, hundred jean after this, the poems of 

 Homer were, with much ceremony, placed by Alexander the Great, surrounded by his 

 generals, in a splendid ark or scrinium, selected from the richest spoils of Darius. 

 + Sometimes calle<l capsa. 



