DÚKR

(-s, -ar), m.

1) any cloth or textile fabric;

2) tablecloth;

3) towel, napkin.

* * *

m. [Engl. duck; Swed. duk; Dan. dug; Germ. tuch]:—any cloth or texture, Bárð. 160; vaðmáls-d., lín-d., etc., a cloak of wadmal, linen, etc.: a carpet, Fms. ix. 219: tapestry in a church, fimm dúka ok tvá þar í buna, annarr með rautt silki, Vm. 77, vide altaris-dúkr, 20: a neck-kerchief of a lady, dúkr á hálsi, Rm. 16.

β. a table-cloth (borð-dúkr); as to the ancient Scandin. custom of covering the table with a cloth, vide esp. Nj. ch. 117, Bs. i. 475, Guðm. S. ch. 43; and for still earlier times the old heathen poem Rm., where Móðir, the yeoman’s good-wife, covers the table with a ‘marked’ (i. e. stitched) white linen cloth, 28; whilst Edda, the old bondman’s good-wife, puts the food on an uncovered table (verse 4); by a mishap the transcriber of Ob. (the only MS. wherein this poem is preserved) has skipped over a verse in the second line of verse 17, so that we are unable to say how Amma, the husbandman’s good-wife, dressed her table: the proverb, eptir dúk og disk, i. e. post festum.

γ. a towel; at banquets a servant went round to the guests in turn bearing a basin and a towel on the shoulder, Lv. ch. 13; to be served first was a mark of honour; cp. also Nj. l. c., Har. S. Harðr. ch. 79 (the Danish king and the old woman): a napkin, Blas. 45, 655 xvii. 5: belonging to the priest’s vestment, Pm. 133; d. ok corporale, Vm. 154, Stj. Gen. xxiv. 65 (a veil).