Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Centunculus

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

CENTUN'CULUS. Diminutive of CENTO; and applied in the same senses as there mentioned (Apul. Met. i. p. 5. Liv. vii. 4. Edict. Dioclet. p. 21.); and from a passage of Apuleius (Apol. p. 422. mimi centunculo), the same word is also believed to indicate a dress of chequered pattern, like what is now called harlequin's, which is undoubtedly of great antiquity; for in the Museum at Naples, there is preserved a fictile vase on which Bacchus is represented in a burlesque character, and draped precisely like our modern harlequin.