Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Raster

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. 

RAS'TER, RAS'TRUS and -UM. An agricultural implement of a mixed character, between our fork, rake, and hoe, both as regards the form of the object and the manner in which it was used. It resembled the fork and rake, in so far that the head, which was made of iron (Cato, R. R. x. 3. xi. 4.), but very heavy (Virg. Georg. i. 164.), contained two, three, or sometimes four prongs (quadridens, Cato, ll. cc.), set at intervals apart (Isidor. Orig. xx. 14. 6., a raritate dentium), and arranged, like the rake, transversely across the handle at right angles with it, not in direct continuation, like the common fork; but the ordinary method of using it resembled that of a man hoeing with energy, it being raised up from the earth at each stroke (Senec. Ira, ii. 5.) and then driven down forcibly upon or into it (Celsus, ap. Non. s. v. p. 222.). Thus it was employed in digging and clearing the surface of the soil (Varro, L. L. v. 136. Virg. Georg. iii. 534.); for subduing or working the land, instead of ploughing (Id. Aen. ix. 608.), and more especially for chopping down and breaking into smaller particles any large clods of earth left by the plough, before harrowing, or as a substitute for it (Plin. H. N. xviii. 49. § 3. Virg. Georg. i. 94.). The figure in the wood-cut (Raster/1.1), which is copied from a very ancient MS. of Terence in the Vatican Library, possesses all the qualities described; and though undoubtedly an imperfect portraiture, will enable the reader to form an accurate notion of the real character of the instrument. It forms the headpiece to the first scene of the first act in the Heautontim. being carried on the shoulders of Menedemus, and is evidently intended for an agricultural instrument of the name and nature described, from the dialogue it illustrates. — CHREMES. Istos rastros interea tamen adpone, ne labora. MENDEM. Minime, &c. — and by the accessories of a sheaf of wheat, and a yoke for plough oxen, which accompany the original design. At the same time it exemplifies the difference between the raster and the ligo, an instrument of otherwise similar character and use, but which, instead of having its head formed by two or more distinct prongs, like a rake, or being, as this is, and as Columella expresses it, a "two-horned tool" (bicorne ferrum, Columell. x. 148.), had a continuous blade like the hoe, but notched at its edge, or, in the language of the same author (x. 88.), broken up into teeth — fracti dente ligonis — as shown by the illustration s. LIGO. The term, moreover, is mostly applied in the plural number, because the head was composed of several parts or prongs, instead of a single blade.

2. Raster ligneus. A wooden rake (Columell. ii. 11. 27.); for which the diminutive RASTELLUS is more common.

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  Raster/1.1