Note 29 — TEXTILE FABRICS (continued 2)

This recalls the statement made, centuries before, by Alonso de Cartagena at the Council of Bâle: “And if the English should vaunt the cunning of their cloth-makers, then would I tell them somewhat; for if our country lack the weavers to make a cloth so delicate as the scarlet cloths of London, yet is that substance titled grana (the kermes, or scarlet grain), from which the scarlet cloth receives its pleasantness of smell and brilliancy of hue, raised in the kingdom of Castile, and thence conveyed to England, and even to Italy.”—Larruga, Memorias, Vol. XIV., p. 167.