Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Velum

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. 

VE'LUM (ἱστίον). The sail of a ship in general (Liv. Virg. Ov.); but especially the large square sail, or mainsail, as contradistinguished from the foresail (dolon), the topsail (supparum), and others which bore a distinctive name from their forms or position on the vessel. (Stat. Sylv. iii. 2. 27. Virg. Aen. i. 106.) It was fixed to a yard (antenna) at the top, and formed out of square pieces of cloth sewed together, as represented by the above illustration (Velum/1.1) from the Vatican Virgil.

2. In foul weather, or upon arrival in port, the yard was lowered half mast high, and the sail reefed or clewed up, in the manner represented by the annexed wood-cut (Velum/2.1), from a terra-cotta lamp; which operations were respectively expressed by the phrases demittere antennas (Hirt. B. Alex. 45.), to lower the yard; velum subducere, or antennis subnectere (Hirt. l. c. Ov. Met. xi. 483.), to clew up the sail; velum legere (Virg. Georg. i. 373.), to shorten sail. Compare Vitruv. x. 3. 5. and 6.

3. So, when the ship put out to sea with fair weather, the yard was raised up to the top of the mast, the clew-lines were loosened from the yard, and the corners of the sail drawn down to the deck; as represented in actual operation by the annexed example (Velum/3.1), from a sepulchral bas-relief at Pompeii; and expressed by such phrases as the following: vela facere (Cic. Tusc. iv. 4.), to make all sail; vela pandere (Ib. iv. 5.), to spread the sails; vela solvere and deducere (Virg. Aen. iv. 574. Ov. Met. iii. 663.), to unclew and let down the sail from the yard.

4. (παραπέτασμα). A curtain suspended before the street-door of a house to close the entrance when the door itself stood open. (Suet. Claud. 10. Juv. vi. 228.); in the interior of a house, instead of a door, or for the purpose of making a partition between different apartments, or of dividing one large one into separate parts of smaller dimensions (Plin. Ep. iv. 19. 3.); before the image of a deity in the temples, which was only removed upon occasions of solemnity, as is still the practice in Roman Catholic churches (Apul. Met. xi. pp. 251. 257.); and as a window-curtain to be drawn, like our own, over the shutters (foriculae), to exclude the light more effectually (Juv. ix. 104. Mart. i. 35.). They were either made in one piece, to be drawn up from the ground, which is implied by the expression allevare velum (Sen. Ep. 80.), to raise the curtain; or in two breadths, to be opened in the centre, like the example (Velum/4.1), representing the entrance to Dido's palace in the Vatican Virgil, which was expressed by the phrase vela reducere (Apul. ll. cc.), to draw back the curtains.

5. The drop-scene of a theatre. Ov. A. Am. i. 103. Prop. iv. 1. 15. AULAEA, 4.

6. The canvas awning stretched over head in a theatre or amphitheatre as a protection against the sun and weather. Plin. H. N. xix. 6. Lucret. iv. 73. VELARIUM.

7. Like VELAMEN, a general term for any kind of covering or drapery, whether applied to persons (Cic. Cat. ii. 10.) or things. Id. Verr. ii. 5. 12.

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  Velum/1.1
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  Velum/2.1
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  Velum/3.1
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  Velum/4.1