poem 3
Immediately they came
And took their places severally, and in a several frame
Each stretched a web, the warp whereof was fine. The web was tied
Upon a beam. Between the warp a slay of reed did slide.
The woof on sharpened pins was put betwixt the warp, and wrought
With fingers. And as oft as they had through the warp it brought,
They struck it with a boxwood comb. Both twain of them made haste:
And girding close for handsomeness their garments to their waist
Bestirred their cunning hands apace. Their earnestness was such
As made them never think of pain. They weaved very much
Fine purple that was dyed in Tyre, and colours set so trim
That each in shadowing other seemed the very same with him.
from Arthur Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphosis Book 6, called by
Ezra Pound, in his typically hyperbolic manner, the " most beautiful book in the English language". AG lived 1536 - 1606; the translation was published in 1567.
(The story. Arachne, a mere mortal, stung by the suggestion that her skill at the loom derived from the goddess Minerva, challenged her to a weaving match. The above lines describe the start of this trial. Whereas Minerva's resulting tapestry was respectful in its depiction of the gods, Arachne's showed them in their deceitful human couplings. Arachne was so outraged that Minerva then tore up this work of hers that she tried to hang herself. But, slightly relenting, Minerva saved her only to transform her into a spider to produce thread and weave webs for ever... as do her descendents the Arachnida
The mention of the use both of a reed and of a wooden beater is interesting. I have since been informed that 'boxwood comb' is Golding's slight alteration of the original which mentions only 'the comb's teeth'. Thank you, P.R. Pottelberg of Canada, who also told me the complete Golding translation can be found at:-
www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0074