Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Supplicatio

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. 

SUPPLICA'TIO. A praying upon the bent knees, or in a kneeling posture, as contradistinguished from the erect one (precatio), in which the Romans usually offered up their prayers.

2. The supplicatio was also a solemn public thanksgiving offered to the gods, when all the temples were thrown open, and the statues of the deities brought out and placed upon couches for the people to worship, which, it may be presumed from the term, was done by kneeling down before them. Liv. Cic. &c.