Elder Scrolls

The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered by a Bedouin shepherd in 1947, and are said to have been produced somewhere between the 3rd century B.C. and 70 A.D. The scrolls contain a wide variety of writings including early copies of the Hebrew Bible, along with hymns, calendars and psalms - and may now have an author.

Nearly 200 textiles were found in the same caves, and were similar to an archaeological site in nearby Qumran, leading scholars to believe that an ancient Jewish sect called the Essenes were involved in the scroll writing. All the textiles were made of linen, rather than wool - the preferred textile used in ancient Israel (you remember their commercials: "the look, the feel of cotton wool"), and were bleached white or lacked decoration, unlike other vividly colored fabrics from the period.

Naturally, not everyone agrees, and some think the scrolls were deposited in the caves by refugees fleeing the Roman army after Jerusalem was conquered in A.D. 70. Linen could have been chosen as scroll wrapping for religious reasons or perhaps because the priests responsible for storing the scrolls also wore linen clothing. The Essenes however, according to ancient Jewish writer Flavius Josephus, not ony lived in Qumran, but "made a point of keeping a dry skin and always being dressed in white". Touché!

Now if we could only figure out who wrote that other old religious text...