Yәsha·yâh′ u 29.11; Yir·mәyâh′ u 32.10; Yәkhëz·qeil′ 2.9; and Dâ·ni·eil′ 12.4, 9.
According to the Encyclopedia Judaica, "Seals were normally used for signing documents. All sorts of objects were sealed to mark ownership (Talmud Tosephta to Avodah Zarah 5.1, 468 and parallels). The seal was employed from the beginning of the historical era as a method of identifying property, as protection against theft, to mark the clay stoppers of oil and wine jars or the strip with which packaged goods were bound, and for other uses. Gradually, seals became invested with magic powers. In Egypt, seals were used to sign papyrus scrolls."
This would have been a conical seal "with round, or octagonal, somewhat convex bases" that "were commonly used." These seals were pressed into soft clay, leaving an impression of the engraving on their base as a seal in the clay. "A lump of clay with the seal imprint '[Gәdalyâh], steward of the palace' which was used to seal the cord around a papyrus scroll", dating from the 6th-8th centuries B.C.E., was found. During the period in which the author of Unveiling was writing, such seals were engraved with emblems, ritual motifs, decorative motifs, and figures (such as a Mәnor·âh′ , etc.; human figures wouldn't have been used in religious Jewish seals). It would appear that this scroll was in seven separate chapters. The seventh section was rolled up, bound with a cord, and the cord sealed with a lump of clay having the stamped impression or seal.
The lump of clay would probably have hung by the cord from the bottom of the scroll, in order that subsequent sections could be rolled around the first (seventh) section. The sixth section would then have been rolled around the seventh with the seventh seal hanging down below the scroll from inside the sixth scroll. The sixth section would then have been sealed in the same manner, and so forth through the first seal.
Since the scroll is opened and read in the reverse order from its writing and sealing, the first section to be sealed would be the last to be opened and read, the second section to be sealed would be the next-to-last opened and read, and so forth. Since this scroll was written on front and back, and sealed against unauthorized eyes, each section was probably rolled into a blank section before being sealed, to prevent the outside surface of a sealed section from being read without breaking the seal. Cf. also note Unv. 7.8.
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