Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Securis

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. 

SECU'RIS (πέλεκυς). An axe or hatchet, employed as a battle-axe (Curt. iii. 4.); for slaughtering cattle at the sacrifice (Hor. Od. iii. 23. 12. Ov. Trist. iv. 2. 5.); or as a woodman's axe for felling timber (Ov. Fast. iv. 649.), &c. The example (Securis/1.1) is from the column of Trajan.

2. Securis dolabrata. A hatchet with a small cutting edge, like that of the dolabra, projecting from the back part of the regular blade, like the annexed example (Securis/2.1) from the Vatican Virgil; and as contradistinguished from the bipennis, which has two perfect blades, and from the common hatchet, also termed securis simplex, because it has no addition beyond the simple blade. Pallad. R. R. i. 43.

3. The axe inserted in the bundle of rods (fasces) carried by Roman lictors, and with which a criminal was beheaded after he had been beaten with the rods. (Cic. Pis. 34. Liv. ii. 5.) The illustration (Securis/3.1) exhibits the axe and rods bound up together, from a marble bas-relief in the Mattei palace, at Rome.

4. The lunated member on the back part of the vine-dresser's pruning-bill, which is clearly detailed in the annexed illustration (Securis/4.1), representing a design of that instrument, from a very ancient MS. of Columella. Columell. iv. 25. 1.

5. A pick-axe, of similar form, use, and character to the same instrument in our own day; as shown by the annexed example (Securis/5.1), from a sepulchral bas-relief. Stat. Sylv. ii. 2. 87.

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  Securis/1.1
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  Securis/2.1
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  Securis/3.1
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  Securis/4.1
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  Securis/5.1