Newport News High School - Anchor Yearbook (Newport News, VA)

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THE PAPYRUS PLANT Margaret Jenkins, ’12 (From “The Student,” October, 1912) Paper is today a necessary article. It is so commonly used by everyone that we would not know what to do without it. In ancient times paper was only used for the writing of books and im- portant documents. It could be pur- chased by the rich only. Strange it is today that we are suffering from an insufficient supply as did the peo- ple of ancient times. There are many materials from which paper is made, and many grades of paper. Most of our paper is made from wood pulp. Soft, tender shoots of the willow and other woods are cut and manufactured into paper. From Egypt we get many things that influences modern life. Mathe- matics is said to have originated in Egypt. Much of the learning of to- days dates back to Egyptian history. The first great library of the world was at Alexandria in Egypt. This library w ' as not composed of books such as we have, but of rolls. The leaves were not pasted together and twenty leaves were joined together, making a larger roll or volume. These sheets were made from the papyrus plant, one of the many in- teresting things of Egypt. This plant has many species and is found in many places. When it was extensive- ly used it was cultivated in large quantities in a delta on the Nile. It has now disappeared from the lower Nile entirely and is found near the sources of that river only. A species of the plant grows in Sicily and that is the variety that is commonly known by botanists of today. Our word paper is derived from papyrus and our word Bible from the Greek word for the same plant. Our words charter, chart and card are de- rived from the Roman name for papy- rus. The papyrus thickets on the upper Nile are said to present a wonderful sight. One described it as follows: “Here was lifted up a forest without branches; these bushes without leaves; this harvest in the waters; this ornament of the swamps.” Strabo describes it as, “A bare pale supporting a bench on the top.” The roots of the papyrus are quite large from which there come numbers of small rootlets extending into the low grounds or water. The plant grows up from a root, a bare pole from ten to twenty feet above the water or ground. From the top of it there appeared a head of small leaves. The architectual ornamental de- signs of the ancients were taken largely from the Satus flower, but the papyrus is seen on their tomb and in many places as a decoration. In the time of the pyramids we find the harvest of the papyrus represented, and in the oldest inscriptions we find

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UIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII | JHumni Supplement HELEN ELIZABETH DELK President of the Alumni Association O EDICATED to the New and Greater Newport News High School with all her Splendid History, Sacred Traditions and Precious Memories, which as her past, are the glowing promise and faithful prophecy of a future even more glorious in the Service of Mankind. n llllllllllllllllllllllltllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllMlllllllllllllllllllllllllMMllllllll 1JIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIMIIMIIIIIIIIIII Lj

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THE BEACON 107 pictures of the papyrus plant among the hieroglyphical characters. The papyrus is perhaps more typical of the earliest times than the Satus flower. It is used by the builders of the pyramids in showing the land- scape of that region. It was a mody useful plant to the ancients. The roots of one variety were eaten by the Egyptians. It furnished perfumes for them also. It was used as a medicine and from it were made many curatives. Plutarch relates that when Agesilaus came to Egypt a wreath of papyrus was presented to him. From the fibre of papyrus a kind of silk was made, mats, mattresses and carpets were woven and rope was also manufactured from it. It is said Xerxes used papyrus rope in making his bridge of boats across the Helle- spont. It is told that at the marriage of Philogy with Mercury, the feet of the bride were adorned with papyrus shoes so that the feet as well as the head of Philogy might be immersed in books. The most important use of this plant was its use as a material for making paper. The only paper which the ancient world had up to about 500 B. C. was made from papy- rus. The manufacture extended from Egypt to Greece, and finally Rome manufactured more than any other part of the world. In spite of this a paper famine occurred under the reign of Tiberius. The fibre of this plant was cut into thin pieces by a sharp knife. These were placed upon a table and beaten and then rubbed with an ivory tooth. Across these were placed other thin slices of the plant and these were fastened together by paste made of the white of an egg or starch. Sometimes there were two layers and sometimes three layers to form a leaf. It varied greatly in quality. This paper was damaged by moisture very quickly, but in dry regions it lasted several hundred years. Even in the dry countries it began to crumble after a hundred or two hun- dred years, and many books have been lost even though every effort known to the ancients was put forth to pre- serve them. The oldest of these papyrus rolls which have been preserved were found at Herculanium, and these were pre- served because they were covered by the dry ashes. When the library of Attalus had reached 20,000 volumes, Ptolemy, who considered himself the special patron of the library at Alexandria, became jealous and refused to allow papyrus to be carried out of Egypt. Attacks was thus forced to device some other- writing material and thus parchment made out of sheep skin began to take the place of the ancient papyrus. A HIGH SCHOOL CAREER— ITS TWISTS AND TURNS (From “The Anchor,” 1914) Newport News, Va., June 1, 1914. Well Pal:— Here I am at the end of the ses- sion, and almost at the end of my High School career, and some glad to get there, too, if you will listen to me. You know, this has been a queer race, and the reason I’ve come out in such good shape, and my classmate Jim so winded, is simply this — he doesn’t know the ins and outs of the game, while I don’t mind confessing I do. When I started out here in this old High, I began as a grinder — day in and day out, nothing but study, study. (It reminds me of old Jim across the way.) Well, somehow the role didn’t seem just the one for me, and I de-