Brewer's: Mosaic Work

is not connected with the proper name Moses, but with the Muses (Latin, opus muscum, musium, or musivum; Greek, mouseion; French, mosaique; Italian, mosaico). Pliny says it was so called because these tesselated floors were first used in the grottoes consecrated to the Muses (xxxv. 21, s. 42). The most famous workman in mosaic work was Sosus of Pergamos, who wrought the rich pavement in the common-hall, called Asaroton oecon. (Pliny: Natural History, xxxvi. 4, 64.)

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