Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Cupa

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

CU'PA (γαῦλος). A cask, or butt; made with wooden staves (tabulae, Pallad. i. 38. 1.), and bound round with iron hoops (circuli, Pet. Sat. 60. 3. Plin. H. N. xiv. 27.), in which wine, vinegar, and other articles were kept and transported from place to place; whence vinum de cupa (Cic. Pis. 27.) is equivalent to our expression out of the wood. The example (Cupa/1.1) is copied from the Column of Trajan.

2. (κώπη). An oblong block of wood, forming one of the component parts in a trapetum, or machine for bruising olives. It was made of elm or beech, and perforated through its centre, in order to be slipped on to a thick iron pivot (columella ferrea), which projected from the top of the stone cylinder (miliarium) in that machine. The object of it was twofold: to form a block for receiving the ends of the axles, which are inserted in it in the engraving, and on which the wheels (orbes) were suspended, while at the same time it enabled them to move in a circular direction round the bruising vat (mortarium) by turning round the pivot passing through its centre from the top of the upright stone cylinder on which it was placed. It was, therefore, cased with plates of metal, to prevent friction. (Cato, R. R. xxi. 1 — 4). The specimen (Cupa/2.1) here introduced is restored from the fragments of a trapetum discovered at the ancient Stabia, the wood-work of which had perished, but the iron plates remained entire, as well as the portions of the two axles inserted in it. The figure, however, sufficiently explains the meaning of the name, and why it was so called; for the word, in its literal sense, signifies the handle of an oar (Diodor. Sic. iii. 3. and Agath. quoted by Wesseling ad l.), to which the cupa of a trapetum, as shown by the engraving, bears a close resemblance. The situation occupied by it on the machine, and the manner in which it acted will be better understood by referring to the illustration s. TRAPETUM, where it is marked 5.

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  Cupa/1.1
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  Cupa/2.1