Umbrellas and their History | Page 6

in the same way has:--
"Neu defensura calorem Aurea submoveant rapidos umbracula soles."
--Claud., lib. viii., De. iv. cons. Honorii, 1. 340. [Footnote: "Nor. to
protect you from the heat, let the golden umbrella ward off the keen
sun's rays."]
From this we may conclude that the carrying an Umbrella was in some
sort a mark of effeminacy. In another place carrying the Umbrella is
alluded to as one of the duties of a slave:--
"Jam non umbracula tollunt Virginibus," etc. [Footnote: "Now they do
not carry girls' parasols."]
Gorius says that the Umbrella came to Rome from the Etruscans, and
certainly it appears not infrequently on Etruscan vases, as also on later
gems. One gem, figured by Pacudius, shows an Umbrella with a bent
handle, sloping backwards. Strabo describes a sort of screen or
Umbrella worn by Spanish women, but this is not like a modern
Umbrella.
Very many curious facts are connected with the use of the Umbrella
throughout the East, where it was nearly everywhere one of the insignia
of royalty, or at least of high rank.
M. de la Loubère, who was Envoy Extraordinary from the French King
to the King of Siam in 1687 and 1688, wrote an account entitled a
"New Historical Relation of the Kingdom of Siam," which was
translated in 1693 into English. According to his account the use of the
Umbrella was granted to some only of the subjects by the king. An
Umbrella with several circles, as if two or three umbrellas were
fastened on the same stick, was permitted to the king alone, the nobles
carried a single Umbrella with painted cloths hanging from it. The
Talapoins (who seem to have been a sort of Siamese monks) had
Umbrellas made of a palm-leaf cut and folded, so that the stem formed
a handle. The same writer describes the audience-chamber of the King

of Siam. In his quaint old French, he says:--"Pour tout meuble il n'y a
que trois para-sol, un devant la fenêtre, a neuf ronds, & deux à sept
ronds aux deux côtéz de la fenêtre. Le para-sol est en ce Pais-la, ce que
le Dais est en celui-ci."
Tavernier, in his "Voyage to the East," says that on each side of the
Mogul's throne were two Umbrellas, and also describes the hall of the
King of Ava as decorated with an Umbrella. The Mahratta princes, who
reigned at Poonah and Sattara, had the title of Ch'hatra-pati, "Lord of
the Umbrella." Ch'hatra or cháta has been suggested as the derivation
of satrapaes (exatrapaes in Theopompus), and it seems a probable
derivation enough. The cháta of the Indian and Burmese princes is
large and heavy, and requires a special attendant, who has a regular
position in the royal household. In Ava it seems to have been part of
the king's title, that he was "King of the white elephant, and Lord of the
twenty-four Umbrellas." Persons of rank in the Mahratta court, who
were not permitted the right of carrying an Umbrella, used a screen, a
flat vertical disc called AA'-ab-gir, carried by an attendant. Even now
the Umbrella has not lost its emblematic meaning. In 1855 the King of
Burmah directed a letter to the Marquis of Dalhousie in which he styles
himself "His great, glorious, and most excellent Majesty, who reigns
over the kingdoms of Thunaparanta, Tampadipa, and all the great
Umbrella-wearing chiefs of the Eastern countries," &c.
Thus we see that the same signification which was attached to the
Umbrella by the ancient people of Nineveh, still remains connected
with it even in our own time.
In the Great Exhibition of 1851 was the splendid Umbrella belonging
to his Highness the Maharajah of Najpoor. The ribs and stretchers,
sixteen in number, divided the Umbrella into as many segments,
covered with silk, exquisitely embroidered with gold and silver
ornaments. The upper part of the design was complete in each
department, but at the lower, it was formed into a graceful running
border, to which a fringe was attached. The handle was hollow and
formed of thick silver plates.
In Bengal it appears that no distinction is attached to the Umbrella,

since the poorer classes there use a cháta or small Umbrella, made of
leaves of the Licerata peltata. These are of conical form and have
numerous ribs and stretchers. The higher class in Assam use a similar
Umbrella.
In China the use of the Umbrella does not appear to have been confined,
as in India and Persia, to royalty; but it was always, as it is now, a mark
of high rank, though not exclusively so. There seems to have been no
particular rule about it, but it carried with it some peculiar distinction;
for, on one occasion at least, we hear of twenty-four Umbrellas being
carried before the