Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Plaustrum

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. 

PLAUS'TRUM (ἅμαξα). A wagon on two wheels usually drawn by oxen, and particularly employed in country occupations for the conveyance of heavy loads and produce of every description. (Plaut. Aul. iii. 5. 31.) Though we make use of the term wagon as the nearest corresponding expression for the Roman plaustrum, that by no means suggests a true notion of the actual object, which in reality consisted of nothing more than a strong platform of boards placed upon a pair of wheels, that were not radiated with spokes (radii), but formed out of a tambourine of solid wood (tympanum), fixed permanently to the axle, so that the whole, both wheels and axle, revolved together; and this explains why the plaustrum is usually spoken of as a noisy and creaking cart (stridens, Virg. Georg. iii. 536. Ov. Trist. iii. 10. 59.) The load itself was merely fastened upon this platform, when of a nature to be so disposed; or was included in a large basket (scirpea in plaustro. Ov. Fast. vi. 680.), as in the present example (Plaustrum/1.1) from a Roman bas-relief, when composed of many small articles which could not otherwise be held together; or, in other cases, a moveable rail was affixed to the sides, which kept the load together, without concealing it; or, as Varro expresses it, left it open on all sides (ex omni parte palam, Varro, L. L. v. 140.), as in the annexed specimen (Plaustrum/1.2), also from a bas-relief.

2. Plaustrum majus. (Cato, R. R. x. 2. Varro, R. R. i. 22. 3.) A wagon of the same description, and employed for similar purposes, but of larger dimensions, and placed upon four wheels instead of two, as exhibited by the annexed example (Plaustrum/2.1), from a sepulchral bas-relief discovered at Langres in France.

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  Plaustrum/1.1
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  Plaustrum/1.2
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  Plaustrum/2.1