According to Hugh Nibley, the reader should note that the word used here in Alma 4:6 is "silks" in the plural. What do they mean by "silks"? There is one silk. No there isn't. Silk is any very fine cloth. . . . It tells us in Harper's big Latin dictionary that this word silk refers in general to any fine fiber. In English it's perfectly legitimate to call any fine fiber silk. [Hugh W. Nibley, Teachings of the Book of Mormon, Semester 2, pp. 258-259] [See the commentary on Alma 1:29]