le histories (_History of Germany_, _History of
Saxony_, _History of Bavaria_, _Universal History of Biographies_).

BOTTLE (Fr. bouteille, from a diminutive of the Lat. _butta_, a flask;
cf. Eng. "butt"), a vessel for containing liquids, generally as opposed
to one for drinking from (though this probably is not excluded), and
with a narrow neck to facilitate closing and pouring. The first bottles
were probably made of the skins of animals. In the _Iliad_ (iii. 247)
the attendants are represented as bearing wine for use in a bottle made
of goat's skin. The ancient Egyptians used skins for this purpose, and
from the language employed by Herodotus (ii. 121), it appears that a
bottle was formed by sewing up the skin and leaving the projection of
the leg and foot to serve as a vent, which was hence termed [Greek:
podeon]. The aperture was closed with a plug or a string. Skin bottles
of various forms occur on Egyptian monuments. The Greeks and Romans also
were accustomed to use bottles made of skins; and in the southern parts
Europe they are still used for the transport of wine. The first of
explicit reference to bottles of skin in Scripture occurs in Joshua (ix.
4), where it is said that the Gibeonites took "old sacks upon their
asses, and wine-bottles _old and rent and bound up_." The objection to
putting "new wine into old bottles" (Matt. ix. 17) is that the skin,
already stretched and weakened by use, is liable to burst under the
pressure of the gas from new wine. Skins are still most extensively used
throughout western Asia for the conveyance and storage of water. It is
an error to represent the bottles of the ancient Hebrews as being made
exclusively of skins. In Jer. xix. 1 the prophet speaks of "a potter's
earthen vessel." The Egyptians (see EGYPT: _Art and Archaeology_)
possessed vases and bottles of hard stone, alabaster, glass, ivory,
bone, porcelain, bronze, silver and gold, and also of glazed pottery or
common earthenware. In modern times bottles are usually made of glass
(q.v.), or occasionally of earthenware. The glass bottle industry has
attained enormous dimensions, whether for wine, beer, &c., or mineral
waters; and labour-saving machinery for filling the bottles has been
introduced, as well as for corking or stoppering, for labelling and for
washing them.

[Illustration: Roman Skin Bottles, from specimens at Pompeii and
Herculaneum.]

BOTTLE-BRUSH PLANTS, a genus of Australian plants, known b