Acts 16:14
Acts 16:14
And a certain woman, named Lydia
Whether this woman was a Jewess or a Gentile, is not certain, her name will not determine; she might be called so from the country of Lydia, which was in Asia minor, and where was Thyatira, her native place; Horace makes frequent mention of one of this name F7 and it might be a Jewish name; we read of R. Simeon ben Lydia F8; and as these seem to be Jewish women that met at this oratory, she might be one:
a seller of purple;
either of purple silks, much wore in the eastern countries; or of the purple dye, which in,
``Then Judas returned to spoil the tents, where they got much gold, and silver, and blue silk, and purple of the sea, and great riches.'' (1 Maccabees 4:23)is called "purple of the sea", or "sea purple"; it being the blood or juice of a turbinated shell fish, which the Jews call (Nwzlx) , "Chalson": this they speak of as a shellfish; hence those words F9,
``go and learn of the Chalson, for all the while it grows, its shell grows with it:''and that purple was dyed with the blood of it, appears from the following instances; "the best fruits in the land", ( Genesis 43:11 ) are interpreted F11, the things that are the most famous in the world, as the Chalson with whose blood, as the gloss on the passage says, they dye purple: and the purple dyed with this was very valuable, and fetched a good price; the tribe of Zebulun is represented F12, as complaining to God, that he had given to their brethren fields and vineyards, to them mountains and hills, to their brethren lands, and to them seas and rivers; to which it is replied, all will stand in need of thee, because of Chalson; as it is said, ( Deuteronomy 33:19 ) "They shall suck of the abundance of the seas"; the gloss upon it, interpreting the word Chalson, is, it comes out of the sea to the mountains, and with its blood they dye purple, which is sold at a very dear price. The text in ( Deuteronomy 33:19 ) is thus paraphrased by Jonathan the Targumist;
``at the shore of the sea they dwell (i.e. they of the tribe of Zebulun), and they delight themselves with (the fish) Tuny, and take Chalson, and with its blood dye purple the threads of their garments.''And so Maimonides says F13, that they use this in dying the fringes on the borders of their garments; after they have scoured the wool, and the like, that it may take the dye, he says,
``they take of the blood of Chalson, which is a fish whose colour is like the colour of purple, and its blood is black like ink, and it is found in the salt sea,''particularly about Tyre; so the husbandmen in ( Jeremiah 52:16 ) are interpreted F14, they that catch Chalson from the ladder of Tyre to Chippah, or the shore; the gloss explains it, those that squeeze and press the Chalson, to fetch out its blood: and with all this agree the modern accounts given of purple, as follow;
``purple was much esteemed among the ancients, especially the Tyrian purple; which underwent more dyes than the rest, and which was almost peculiar to emperors and kings, yet this purple did not exceed that now in use.--The ancient purple was tinged, or given with the blood or juice of a precious turbinated testaceous sea fish, called by the Greeks (porfura) , and by the Latins "purpura".--In the seas of the Spanish West Indies, about Nicoya, is found a shell fish, which perfectly resembles the ancient "purpura", and in all probability is the very same--these are gathered very plentifully in the spring, and by rubbing one against another, yield a kind of saliva, or thick glair, resembling soft wax; but the purple dye is in the throat of the fish, and the finest part in a little white vein--the chief riches of Nicoya consist in this fish; cloth of Segovia dyed with it, is sold for twenty crowns the ell.--In the Philosoph. Transact., we have an account of a purple fish discovered in 1686, by Mr. W. Cole, on the coasts of Somersetshire, South Wales, &c, where it is found in great abundance.--The fish is a kind of "buccinum", a name given by the ancients to all fishes, whose shell bears any resemblance to a hunting horn; and it appears from Pliny, that part of the ancient purple was taken from this kind of shell fish. The Caribbee Islands have likewise their "purple" fish; it is called "burgan", being of the size of the end of the finger, and resembling our periwinkles; its shell is of a brownish azure, its flesh white, its intestines of a very bright red, the colour whereof appears through the body; and it is this that dyes that froth, which it casts when taken, and which is at first of a violet hue, bordering on blue; to oblige them to yield the greater quantity of froth, they lay them on a plate, and shake and beat them against one another, upon which the plate is immediately covered with the froth, which is received on a linen cloth, and becomes "purple", in proportion as it dries F15.''
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