56 EDIBLE BRITISH MOLLUSKS. 



that "in the Indian Sea, and also off the ccast of Ar- 

 menia, Persia, Susiana, and Babylonia, a fish is caught 

 very like an oyster ; large and of oblong shape, contain- 

 ing within its shell flesh which is plentiful, white, and 

 very fragrant, and from it the men pick out white bones, 

 called by them pearls. And of these they make neck- 

 laces and chains for the hands and feet, of which the 

 Persians are very fond, as are the Medes and all Asia- 

 tics, esteeming them as much more valuable than golden 

 ornaments."* Occasionally, they are called stones and 

 bones by Greek authors ; and Tertullian calls them mala- 

 dies of shell-fish and warts — " concharum vitia et ver- 

 rucas." Pliny statesf that when pearls grow old they 

 become thick and adhere to the shell, from which they can 

 only be separated by a file ; again, that pearls which 

 have one surface flat and the other spherical, opposite to 

 the plane side, are for that reason called tympania, or- 

 tambour-pearls, " quibus una tantum est facies, et ab ea 

 rotunditas, aversis planities,ob id tympania nominantur." 

 The "tympana," or hand-drums of the ancients, were 

 often of a semi-globular shape, like the kettle-drums of 

 the present day. Shells which had pearls still adhering 

 to them were used as boxes for unguents. J Long pear- 

 shaped pearls, called elenchi, had their peculiar value, re- 

 sembling the alabaster boxes in form which were used for 

 ointments. Earrings were invented by the Roman 

 ladies, called "crotalia, or castanet pendants, from the 

 pearls rattling as they knocked against each other." § 

 The story of Cleopatra swallowing the pearl, in order 



* Athenceus, vol. i. p. 155. 

 f Pliny, Nat. Hist. vol. ii. b. is. p. 432. 

 % Pliny, Nat. Hist. b. ix. p. 432, and note. 

 § Pliny's Nat. Hist. vol. ii. b. ix. p. 435. 



