Sieve
Sieve (כּבָרָה, kebarah, Am 9:9; נָפָה, naphdh, a winnowing fan, Isa 30:28; to "sift" is נוּעִ, nua, or נוּŠ, to wave [as often rendered], or throw up into the air for winnowing; σινίαζω, Lu 22:31). Among the ancient Egyptians sieves were often made of string, but some of an inferior quality, and for coarse work, were constructed of small thin rushes or reeds (very similar to those used by the Egyptians for writing, and frequently found in the tablets of the scribes); a specimen of which kind of sieve is in the Paris Museum. The paintings also represent them made of the same materials; and the first they used were evidently of this humble quality, since the hieroglyphic indicating a sieve is borrowed from them. Horse-hair sieves are ascribed by Pliny to the Gauls; the Spaniards, he says, made them of string, and the Egyptians of papyrus stalks and rushes. See Wilkinson, Anc. Egypt. ii, 95.
