of the Sacred Writings. 75 



sure. In such a state of society, the elegant, as well as useful^ 

 arts are cultivated. 



Cotton, which they either got at home, or imported from a- 

 broad, was not neglected, and doubtless they had a name for 

 the plant, as well as the contents of the pod, but what either was 

 can now be only matter of conjecture. The language of the Egyp- 

 tians, spoken in the time of the Patriarchs, is now lost, and we 

 can only judge of it from the Coptic, the state into which 

 the Egyptian passed at the period of the Ptolemies, which, 

 though now a dead language, is preserved in a translation of the 

 Hebrew and Greek Scriptures, and a few tracts, which are of 

 no farther importance than that they are written in this language. 



If therefore, shesh, the Hebrew term for fine linen, be bor- 

 rowed from the Egyptians, the Coptic teaches us, that it should 

 be pronounced sheshe ; Che or checJie, cJien or chenchen, in that 

 language signifying wood ; chens, wooden wool ; and chentoo, a 

 bit, part or portion of wood^ often used in the Coptic New Tes- 

 tament, as the proper translation of sindon. 



Now sindon is one of two words in the Greek New Testa- 

 ment, translated linen and fine linen» If we are guided by 

 the Coptic, however, it ought to be translated a cotton cloth or 

 garment. It was in fact a cotton shawl or robe, either manufac- 

 tured by the Zidonians, sindon being the way in which the Greeks 

 pronounced Zidon, the city famed for this manufacture; or 

 rather according to Reland and Sir William Jones, this shawl or 

 robe was brought to Arabia, Syria, and the shores of the Mediter- 

 ranean, from the banks of the Indus, this river being called 

 Sind by the natives ; and in relation to which the shawl or robe 

 now mentioned was called Sindon by the same people. 



In the time of Solomon, huts^ also translated fine linen in 

 the Old Testament, seems to have come into use among the Jews; 

 but that word is not now found in the Coptic^ though there is a 

 strong presumption that it was once common. Bo or hoo^ signify- 

 ing wood in the saidic or dialect of Upper Egypt, is still pre- 

 served ; and may not buts^ wooden wool, be as easily formed 

 from ho or hoo ; as chens, with the same signification, from che or 

 chen ? 



At any rate the Hebrews from the time of Solomon were in 

 possession of this term ; and if they did not get it from the 

 Egyptians, they must have gotten it from the Arabians, Persians 



