THE COTTON PLANT IN EGYPT 



SECTION I 



HISTORICAL 15 * 



THE history of civilisation in the Nile Valley can be 

 followed into the past for half a hundred centuries. 

 Textile fabrics have been found among the earliest 

 remains of Ancient Egypt, but in none of these can we 

 recognise any fragment of the plant upon which is based 

 the latter-day prosperity of the country. 



The cloth found in the ancient remains, notably as 

 mummy- wrappings, was invariably made of linen, and 

 though a watch is being kept by the Antiquities Depart- 

 ment for traces of the cotton plant, none have yet been 

 discovered. Still there is a strong presumption that the 

 genus Gossypium is no modern upstart in Egypt, for in 

 spite of philological confusion it seems clear that cotton 

 was in common use during Ptolemaic times, though flax 

 was exclusively employed for funereal purposes. Pliny 

 gives an unmistakable description of a cotton plant which 

 grew in the upper part of Egypt, from which garments 

 were made for the priests, Herodotus describes how Amasis 

 sent a cotton corselet of wonderful fineness to the 

 Lacedaemonians, and the famous tri-lingual " Rosetta 



* Reference numbers appearing in the text denote publications by the 

 Author, as enumerated in the Bibliography. References to other authors 

 therein enumerated are made in the usual manner, with a number in 

 brackets where more than one paper is given. 



B 



