Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Succinctus

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. 

SUCCINC'TUS (ὑποζώστος). Wearing a girdle round the tunic, low down under the ribs (from the Greek ὑπόζωμα, which signifies the diaphragm or midriff). The object of this was not simply to keep the dress closely adjusted to the figure, but to enable the wearer to shorten it by drawing up the skirts through the belt in order to leave the lower extremities free and unembarrassed by drapery; consequently the usage of the term invariably indicates that the person to whom it is applied is engaged in active or violent exercise. Thus, the huntress Diana is appropriately equipped in a succinct tunic (Ov. Am. iii. 2. 31. Id. Met. x. 536.), as in the annexed example (Succinctus/1.1) from a terra-cotta lamp; the running foot-man who preceded his master's carriage (cursor, Mart. xii. 24.); the slave who waited at table (Pet. Sat. 60. 8. and wood-cut s. PINCERNA); the tutelary spirits (LARES. Pers. v. 31. and wood-cut s. v.); and the ministers who slaughtered the cattle at a sacrifice. (Ov. Fast. iv. 413. Prop. iv. 3. 62., and wood-cuts s. HOSTIA.) Female figures which have the tunic adjusted in this way are furnished with two girdles, a cingulum above, and the succingulum below, as shown by the example annexed; but male ones, with a very few exceptions, and those mostly of Phrygian and other Asiatic races, have only the lowest one, like the next illustration.

2. Succinctus gladio, pugione, cultro, &c. Wearing a sword, dagger, knife, &c., attached to a belt or girdle, encircling the diaphragm, or just over the loins, as exhibited by the annexed figure (Succinctus/2.1) from a painting of Pompeii. Auctor. ad Herenn. iv. 52. Cic. Phil. xiii. 16. Liv. vii. 5.

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  Succinctus/1.1
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  Succinctus/2.1