De Rerum Natura

Lucretius

Lucretius. De Rerum Natura. William Ellery Leonard. E. P. Dutton. 1916.

  1. Now, clothes of roughly inter-plaited strands
  2. Were earlier than loom-wove coverings;
  3. The loom-wove later than man's iron is,
  4. Since iron is needful in the weaving art,
  5. Nor by no other means can there be wrought
  6. Such polished tools- the treadles, spindles, shuttles,
  7. And sounding yarn-beams. And nature forced the men,
  8. Before the woman kind, to work the wool:
  9. For all the male kind far excels in skill,
  10. And cleverer is by much- until at last
  11. The rugged farmer folk jeered at such tasks,
  12. And so were eager soon to give them o'er
  13. To women's hands, and in more hardy toil
  14. To harden arms and hands.