How did ancient writers describe silk-making?

Silk was a prized fabric: Cowan says it remained scarce among Romans for centuries and was valued at its weight in gold^[1]. He reports three different ancient accounts of where its thread came from:

• Pausanias said the “Ceres,” whom the passage calls an Ethiopian race, raised worms indoors, fed them oatmeal for four years and green reed in the fifth, then drew thread from them after they died^[2].
• Aristotle described thread unwound from a large horned caterpillar’s pupa, its developing stage; Cowan notes that Aristotle did not explicitly use the word “pupa”^[3].
• Pliny described worms gathering down from leaves, working it into thread and wrapping it around themselves to make nests^[4].

These are the period descriptions Cowan records, not one agreed ancient explanation.