CHAPTER VI.
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.
Chaldaea, unlike Egypt, has preserved to our day but few records of the private or domestic life of its inhabitants.

Beyond the funereal customs, to which reference was made in the last chapter, we can obtain from the monuments but a very scanty account of their general mode of life, manners, and usages.

Some attempt, however, must be made to throw together the few points of this nature on which we have obtained any light from recent researches in Mesopotamia.
The ordinary dress of the common people among the Chaldaeans seems to have consisted of a single garment, a short tunic, tied round the waist, and reaching thence to the knees, a costume very similar to that worn by the Madan Arabs at the present day.

To this may sometimes have been added an _abba,_ or cloak, thrown over the shoulders, and falling below the tunic, about half-way down the calf of the leg.

The material of the former we may perhaps presume to have been linen, which best suits the climate, and is a fabric found in the ancient tombs.