LUX 
LUXURIOUSLY, adv. Delicioully; voluptuoufly: 
He never fupt in folemn ftate; 
Nor day to night luxurioujly did join. Drydcn. 
LUXU'RIOUSNESS, f. The ftate or quality of being 
luxurious ; luxury. 
LUN'URY, f. [luxure, old French ; luxuria, Lat.] Vo- 
luptuoufnefs ; addiclednefs to pleafure.—Riches expofe a 
man to pride and luxury, and a foolilh elation of heart. 
Addifon's Spectator. 
Egypt with Aflyria ftrove 
In wealth and luxury. Milton . 
Lull; lewdnefs: 
Urge his hateful luxury , 
His beftial appetite in change of luff. 
Which ftretch’d unto their fervants, daughters, wives. 
Shakefpeare. 
Luxuriance ; exuberance.—Young trees of feveral kinds 
let contiguous in a fruitful ground, with the luxury of the 
trees will incorporate. Bacon.— Delicious fare.—He cut the 
fide of the rock for. a garden; and, by laying on it earth, 
furniflied out a kind of luxury for a hermit. Addifon. 
Luxury, among the Romans, prevailed to fuch a degree, 
that feveral laws were made to fupprefs, or at lead limit, 
it. The extravagance of the table began about the time 
of the battle of Aftium, and continued in great excels till 
the reign of Galba. Peacocks, cranes of Malta, nightin¬ 
gales, venifon, wild and tame fowl, were confidered as de¬ 
licacies. A profufion of provifions was the reigning talte. 
Whole wild boars were often ferved up, and fometimes 
they were filled with various fmall animals, and birds of 
different kinds: this dilh they called the Trojan horfe, in 
allufion to the wooden horfe filled with foldiers. Fowls 
and game of all forts were ferved up in whole pyramids, 
piled up in dilhes as broad as moderate tables. Lucullus 
had a particular name for each apartment; and in what¬ 
ever room he ordered his fervants to prepare the enter¬ 
tainment, they knew by the direction the expenfe to 
which they were to go. When he fupped in the Apollo, 
the expence was fixed at 50,000 drachmas, that is, 1250I. 
See Lucullus, p. 752. Mark Antony provided eight 
boars for twelve guelts. Vitellius had a large filver plat¬ 
ter, faid to have coll; a million of fefterces, called Minerva's 
buckler: in this he blended together the livers of gilt- 
heads, the brains of pheafants and peacocks, the tongues 
of phenicopters, and the milts of lampreys. Caligula 
ferved up to his guefts pearls of great value diffolved in 
vinegar; the fame was done alfo by Clodius the fon of 
Asfop the tragedian. Apicius laid afide 90,000,000 of fe¬ 
fterces, befides a mighty revenue, for no other purpofe 
but to be facrificed to luxury ; finding himfelf involved 
in debt, he looked over his accounts, and, though he had 
the fum of 10,000,000 of fefterces Itill left, he poifoned 
himfelf for fear of being ftarved to death. The Roman 
laws to reftrain luxury were Lex Orchia, Fannia, Didia, Li~ 
cinia , Cornelia, and many others : but ail thefe were too 
little; for, as riches increafed amongft them, fo did feu¬ 
dality. 
What were the ideas of luxury entertained in England 
about two centuries ago, may be gathered from the fol¬ 
lowing paflage of Holinlhed ; who, in a difcourfe prefixed 
to his Hiftory, (firlt publilhed in 1577,) fpeaking of the 
increafe of luxury, fays, “ Neither do I fpeak this in re¬ 
proach of any man, God is my judge; but to Ihow, that 
I do rejoice rather to fee how God has blefied us with his 
good gifts, and to behold how that, in a time wherein all 
things are grown to the mod exceffive prices, we yet do 
find means to obtain and atchieve fuch furniture as here¬ 
tofore was impofiible. There are old men yet dwelling in 
•the village where I remain, which have noted three things 
to be marveloully altered in England within their found 
remembrance. One is the multitude of chimneys lately 
sreftedj whereas in their young days there were not 
LUX 60$ 
above two or three, if fo many, in mo ft uplandilh towns 
of the realm (the religious houfes, and manor places of 
their lords always excepted, and peradventure fome great 
perfonages), but each made his fire againll a reredofs- 
[(kreen] in the hall where he drefled his meat and dined. 
The fecond is the great amendment of lodging; for, faid 
they, our fathers and we ourfelves have lain full oft upon 
ftraw pallets covered only with a ftieet, under coverlits 
made of a dogfwaine or horharriets (to ufe their own 
terms), and a good log under their head inftead of a bol¬ 
der. If it were fo that the father or good man of the 
houfe had a mattrafs, or flock-bed, and Iheets, a fack of 
chaff to reft his head upon, he thought himfelf to be as- 
well lodged as the lord of the town. So well were they 
contented, that pillows (faid they) were thought meet 
only for women in childbed ; as for fervants, if they had 
any fheet above them, it was well ; for feldom had they 
any under their bodies to keep them from pricking ftraws„ 
that ran oft through the canvas and their hardened hides. 
The third thing they tell of, is the exchange of treene 
[wooden] platters into pewter, and wooden fpoons into 
filver or tin ; for fo common were all forts of treene veflels 
in old times, that a man (hould hardly find four pieces of 
pewter (of which one was peradventure a fait) in a good 
farmer’s houfe. _ Again; in times paft, men were con¬ 
tented to dwell in houfes builded of fallow, willow. See . 
fo that the ufe of oak was in a manner dedicated wholly 
unto churches, religious houfes, palaces, navigation, Sec. 
But now willow, &c. are rejeifted, and nothing but oak 
any where regarded. And yet fee the change; for, when 
our houfes were builded of willow, then had we oaken 
men; but now that our houfes are come to be made of 
oak, our men are not only become willow, but a great 
many altogether of ftraw ; which is a fore alteration & In 
thefe the courage of the owner was a fuffleient defence to 
keep the houfe in fafety ; but now the aflurance of the 
timber mult defend the men from robbing. Now have 
we many chimneys, and yet our tenderlins complain of 
rheums, catarrhs, and pofes; then had we none but rere- 
doffes, and our heads did never ach. For, as the fmoke in 
thole days was fuppofed to be a fufficient hardening for 
the timber of the houfe ; fo it was reputed a far better 
medicine to keep the good man and his family from the 
quacks or pofe; wherewith, as then, very few were ac¬ 
quainted. Again ; our pewterers in time paft employed 
the ufe of pewter only upon dilhes and pots, and a few 
other trifles for fervice ; whereas now they are grown into 
fuch exquifite cunning, that they can in a manner imitate 
by infulion any form or fafhion, of cup, dilh,fait, bowl, or 
goblet, which is made by the goldfmith’s craft, though, 
they be ever fo curious and very artificially forged. In 
fome places beyond the fea, a garnilh of good flut' Englilh 
pewter (I fay flat, becaufe dilhes and platters in my time 
began to be made deep, and like batons, and are indeed 
more convenient both for fauce and keeping the meat 
warm) is elteemed fo precious as the like number of vef- 
fels that are made of fine filver.” 
Particular inftances of luxury, in eating, however, mi^ht 
be adduced from an earlier period, furpalfing even the ex¬ 
travagance of the Romans. Thus, in the 10th year of 
the reign of Edward IV. (1470), George Nevill, brother 
to the earl of Warwick, at his inftalment into the archie- 
pifcopal fee of York, entertained molt of the nobility and 
principal clergy, when hi 3 bill of fare was 300 quarters of 
wheat, 350 tuns of ale, 104 uins of wine, a pipe of fpiced 
wine, 80 fat oxen, fix wild bulls, 1004 weathers, 300 hoo- s# , 
300 calves, 3000 geefe, 3000 capons, 300 pigs,'100 pea¬ 
cocks, 200 cranes, 200 kids, 2000 chickens, 4000 pigeons, 
4000 rabbits, 204 bitterns, 4000 ducks, 200 pheafants, 500 
partridges, 200 woodcocks, 400 plovers, 100 curlews 100 
quails, 1000 egrets, 200 rees, 40a bucks, does, and’roe¬ 
bucks, 1506 hot venifon palties, 4000 cold ditto, 1000.. 
dilhes of jelly parted, 4000 duties of jelly plain, 4000 cold 
cuftards, zoeo hot cuftards, 300 pikes, 300 breams, eight 
