Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Compes

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

COMPES (πέδη). A fetter, or shackle for the feet; as shown by the preceding wood-cut, and the illustration s. CATULUS.

2. A ring of silver or gold, worn by women round the bottom of the leg, just above the ankle, in the same manner as a bracelet is round the wrist (Plin. H. N. xxxiii. 54. Compare xxxiii. 12. Pet. Sat. 67. 7.), as shown by the annexed engraving (Compes/2.1), from a Pompeian painting of Ariadne. Ornaments of this nature were confined to females of the plebeian classes at Rome, to courtesans, dancing girls, and characters of that description, who went with bare feet, and partially exposed their legs; which would otherwise have been entirely concealed under the long and training drapery of the Roman ladies and matrons. For a similar reason, they are never represented in the Pompeian paintings on figures who wear shoes, but only when the foot and ankle is uncovered; but when Petronius, in the passage cited, places them on the legs of Fortuna above her shoes, it is to ridicule the vulgar ostentation of wealth in the wife of the parvenu by the adoption of an unusual custom.

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  Compes/2.1