Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Murus

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. 

MURUS (τεῖχος). A wall of stone or brick, built as a defence and fortification round a town, in contradistinction to paries, the wall of a house, or any other edifice. (Cic. N. D. iii. 40. Id. Off. i. 11. Caes. B. G. ii. 12.) Town walls were usually constructed with square or round towers (turres) at certain intervals, a fortified gate (porta) at every point from which any of the great roads emanated; sometimes with a trench (fossa) on the outside, having a mound (agger) within it, upon which the ramparts (loricae, propugnacula) were raised, surmounted by turrets (pinnae) to shield the defenders.

2. Murus crinalis. A crown or ornament for the hair, made in imitation of the walls of a town, with its towers and fortifications, attributed by poets and artists to the goddess Cybele, to typify the cities of the earth over which she was presumed to reign; as in the annexed example (Murus/2.1) from a marble bas-relief. Claud. in Eutrop. ii. 284.

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  Murus/2.1