Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Biremis

Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary, and Greek Lexicon (Rich, 1849)

BIRE'MIS (δίκωπος). Literally, furnished with a pair of oars or sculls; and thence used, both adjectively with scapha, and absolutely for a small boat rowed by one man, who handles a pair of sculls, as in the engraving (Biremis/1.1), from an ancient fresco painting. Hor. Od. iii. 29. 62. Lucan. viii. 562. Compare 565. and 611., where the same is designated parva ratis, and alnus.

2. (δίκροτος). Furnished with two banks of oars (ordines); which is the more common application, and designates a bireme or vessel of war, which has two lines of oars on each side, placed in a diagonal position one above the other, as in the example (Biremis/2.1), from a marble bas-relief of the Villa Albani, each oar being worked by a single rower. (Plin. H. N. vii. 57. Caes. B. C. iii. 40. Tac. Hist. v. 23.) That such was the arrangement adopted in the construction of a bireme, is sufficiently evident from the figure in the cut; by the sculptures on Trajan's Column (23. 24. 59. 61. ed. Bartoli), where a similar disposition is indicated; and by the passage of Tacitus (l. c.), which distinguishes a vessel which has its oars placed in a single file (moneris) from the bireme, which, therefore, had them distributed in two — complet quod biremium, quaeque simplici ordine agebantur.

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  Biremis/1.1
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  Biremis/2.1