Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Pictura

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. 

PICTU'RA (γραφή). A drawing or painting with lines or colours; thence the object itself so drawn or painted, a picture; of which the following kinds are enumerated.

1. Pictura in tabula. (Cic. Verr. ii. 4. 1. Quint. vi. 1. 32.) A painting on wood or panel, mostly on a slab of larch, and frequently fitted with two folding doors to shut in the picture and preserve it from dust and dirt, as shown by the annexed example (Pictura/1.1), from a design at Pompeii, representing a picture on panel suspended over a doorway, and also illustrating the method in which such works were hung.

2. Pictura in linteo, or, in sipario. (Plin. H. N. xxxv. 38. Quint. l. c.) A painting on canvas, a material probably brought into use at a much later date than wood; but clearly represented by the annexed example (Pictura/2.1), from a design at Pompeii, which also shows the frame upon which it was stretched very similar to those now employed for embroidery and worsted working.

3. Pictura inusta. (Plin. H. N. xxxv. 39. Ib. 31.) A painting in coloured wax, burnt in by the action of heat, descriptive of one of the processes employed in encaustic painting. See ENCAUSTICA.

4. Pictura udo tectorio. Vitruv. vii. 3. 6. A fresco-painting; that is executed upon a wall coated with very fine cement, made of marble dust and chalk, and painted while the cement is still wet.

5. Pictura textilis. (Cic. Verr. ii. 4. 1. Lucret. ii. 35.) A picture worked in embroidery; a very early invention, for which the natives of Phrygia were celebrated; hence acu pictus means embroidered.

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  Pictura/1.1
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  Pictura/2.1