The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1882-08-18
Something About Tables.

The Greek lady of leisure in Athens
employed herself at the spinning wheel,
and had little need of table, and, beau
tiful in design and form as all Greek
furniture was, one striking natural char
acteristic proclaimed itself in the fur
nishing of the homes. They never had
that for which they could find no prac-
teal use, and, consequently, as tables
were only needed for the purpose of
meals, they appeared only at those
times, and were mere slabs of wood,
which were brought in at the dinner
hour and set down loosely upon their
legs.
The meal over, the table vanished
with the empty plates. In Homeric
days each person had separate table,
and twas only when luxury crept in that
a larger table for the men became COM
mon, while the women dined at separate
ones. Then the custom of lounging on
couches, the elbows resting on the table,
became usual, and the ladies were ex-
the most comfortable attitude they
could find. Even then, however, the
table played so entirely a subordinate
part that we never read of it as being of
handsomer material, or, indeed, as be-
ing of any importance at all, except to
groan under the food, which was of the
most luxurious description.
The Romans, on the contrary, held
their tables in the highest estimation.
They even made collections of them.
Seneca possessed five hundred small
ones. 1t is curious to trace, in the &C
counts old writers give us of Roman
luxury in this respect, sort of likeness
to the taste of modern days. No arti-
Gle of furniture in the Roman house cost
so much as the table. Those with one
foot or pedestal brought enormous
prices. Pliny says that tables were
brought in the first instance from the
East, and were called orbes, not be-
cause they were round but because they
were massive plates of wood. cut from
the trunk of a tree in its whole diam
eter. Yet, oddly enough, we hear very
little of tables in the East or in ancient
history. Moses made table for the
Tabernacle, as if it were something I'M
common, upon which to lay the show
bread. Philo Jud8us describes it as
having Deeu TWO cuUltS long anu Ouo
and half high, and dwells upon it as
a remarkable piece of furniture.
Fashionable tables in the luxurious
Roman homes were called '.monope-
dia," and were made of a massive plate
of wood. resting upon column of ivo-
~; such tables were enormously ex-
pensive, and, according to Pliny, the
wood was brought from Mauritania and
cut from the trunk of the citrus tree.
Some of these pieces of wood were four
feet in diameter, and the ivory column
which supported them was extremely
massive. The greatest care was taken
of such tables. They were polished
and covered with thick cloths made
generally of coarse linen, the first indi-
cation we meet with of the modern ia
blecloth. Cicero had such table. for
which he paid the enormous sum of
l.OOO,0 900 sesterces. Just as to-day the
handsomest walnut-wood tables are
those made of wood cut from the trunk
nearestthe root, SO in the days of Roman
msgnificence highest prices were paid
for the tables made from the last of the
citrus tree, because the wood was dap
pied and marked--Chanaber,s JoarnaI