KARPAS (kar'pas), (Heb. kar-fias', green), occurs in the book of Esther i:6, in the description of the hangings "in the court of the garden of the king's palace," at the titne of the great feast given in the city Shushan, or Susan, by Ahasuerus, who "reigned from India even unto Ethiopia." NVe are told that there were white, green (karpas), and blue hangings fastened with cords of fine linen and purple to silver rings and pillars of marble.
(1) Leek Green. Karpas is translated green in our version, on the authority, it is said, 'of the Chaldee paraphrase,' where it is interpreted leek-green. Rosenmiiller and others derive the Hebrew word from the Arabic kurufs, which sig nifies 'garden parsley,' apium petroselinunt, as if it alluded to the green color of this plant ; at the same time arguing that as 'the word karpas is placed between two other words which undoubt edly denote colors, viz., the white and the purple blue, it probably also does the same.' (2) Cotton. But if two of the words denote colors, it would appear a good reason why the third should refer to the substance which Wa S colored. This, there is little doubt, is what was
intended. The Hebrew karpas is very similar to the Sanscrit karpasum, karpasa, or karpase, signifying the cotton-plant. Celsius (Hierobot. 15g) states that the Arabs and Persians have karphas and kirbas as names for cotton. These 'mast no doubt be derived from the Sanscrit, while the word kapas is now applied throughout India to cotton with the seed, and may even be seen in English prices-current'. Nothing can be more suitable than cotton, white and blue, in the above passage of Esther. Hanging curtains usually in stripes of different colors and padded with cot ton, called purdahs, are employed throughout India as a substitute for doors. This kind of structure was probably introduced by the Persian conquer ors of India,and therefore may serve to explain the object of the colonnade in front of the palace in the ruins of Persepolis. (See Co-rrox.) city), a town in the tribe of Zebulun allotted to the Nlerarite Levites (Josh. xxi:34). Kartah is prob ably identical with KArrAnt (Josh. xix :15).