22

BOOKBINDING IN THE TIMES OF

be quoted to the same effect. Tibullus appears torefer to a cover coloured with yellow :—

“ Lutea sed niveum involvat membrana libellum

but it may be a question whether the colour of theparchment, of which the cover was formed, andwhich assumes a yellow appearance from age, is notthe right construction of the passage.

To Catullus we are indebted for a minute and ela-borate description of ancient binding, In the dedi-cation to Cornelius Nepos he writes—

i( With pumice dry, just polished fine,

To whom present this book of mine,

This little volume, smart and new.” x

And in another of his poems, in ridicule of a personnamed Suffenus, he gives us what may be considereda complete description of the best binding in thetime of Cicero :—

“ AD VARRUM.

“ Suffenus iste, Varre, quern probe nosti,

Homo est venustus, et dicax, et urbanus;

Idemque longe plurimos facit versus.

Puto esse ego illi milliaaut decern aut pluraPerscripta, nec sic, ut fit, in palimpsestolielata; chartae regiae, novi libri,

Novi umbilici, lora rubra, membranaDirecta plumbo, et pumice omnia sequata.” y

which has been thus rendered:—

u Suffenus, that wretch, whom my Yarus well knows,

So pretty, so prating, so over polite,

Has a genius for verse that incessantly flows,

Has a muse which ten thousand fine things can indite.

* Catullus, English Translation, 2 vols. 8vo .—^ Ode 22.