Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Monumentum

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rich, Anthony (1849). The illustrated companion to the Latin dictionary, and Greek lexicon. p. vi. OCLC 894670115. https://archive.org/details/illustratedcompa00rich. 

MONUMEN'TUM (μνήμα, μνημεῖον). In general, any monument, record, or memorial intended to perpetuate the memory of persons or things, such, for instance, as a statue, a building, or a temple, particularly one on which the name of the founder is inscribed. Caes. B. C. ii. 21. Cic. Verr. i. 4. Id. Div. i. 9. Ib. 28.

2. Monumentum sepulcri, or absolutely; a monument, tomb, or sepulchre, erected in memory of a deceased person, including both those in which the remains were actually deposited (sepulcrum, strictly), and such as were merely erected to record the memory of any one apart from the place where his remains were buried. (Florent. Dig. 11. 7. 42. Festus, s. v. Varro, L. L. vi. 45. Sulpic. ad Cic. Fam. iv. 12. Hor. Sat. i. 8. 13. Nepos, Dion. 10.) These monuments were not allowed within the city walls, excepting in a few solitary instances, granted as an especial distinction; but were usually constructed by the sides of the high roads in a long continuous line of magnificent elevation, forming a striking vista, suggestive of moral and noble sentiments to every passerby. The annexed illustration (Monumentum/1.1) represents a range of tombs on each side of the way immediately outside of the gates of Pompeii, on the high road to Herculaneum; and will convey an idea of the imposing character which the approach to ancient Rome must have possessed from the Appian way, on which the monuments of so many of her illustrious men, both civil and military, once stood. The remains and ruins of these are still visible to the eye, in a continuous line along both sides of the deserted road, for a distance of four or fives miles from the city.

3. (γνωρίσματα). The toys or tokens tied round the necks of infants when they were exposed as foundlings, in order that they might be recognized by any members of their families in after years, if they happened to survive (Ter. Eun. iv. 6. 15.); more usually designated by the general term CREPUNDIA, under which a more full description and illustration is introduced.

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  Monumentum/1.1