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CTC Glossary of the Classics Category: Language and Literature > Classical History Date & country: 11/09/2007, USA Words: 1434

Poseidon
god of the sea, horses and earthquakes; son of Cronus and Rhea; read the Homeric Hymn to Poseidon to learn more.

Postulo
(Latin) to ask, to demand, to summon.

Pottage
a Roman staple meal that resembled modern day polenta; pottage was ground grain, e.g., spelt, in a course paste; eventually, the word pultiphagus, pottage eater, took on negative connotations and was used to describe Romans; according to Pliny, the word pulmentaria later described food in general.

Potter
the creator of a vase, does not include the painting of the vase.

Praecentio
(Latin) a prelude set to music.

Praeda
(Latin) the things taken in a war; plunder.

Praefectus Classis
(Latin) the leader of the Roman naval fleet.

Praemedicatus
(Latin) having medicines protecting someone or something.

Praetor
(Latin) Roman magistrate who served as a law court judge; in the absence of the consul, the praetor assumed his administrative duties; eight (8) praetors served at a time and following their services often served next as propraetors; praetors administered and interpreted the jus gentium; praetors in Roman provinces administered law based on the rulings and the patterns of praetors' rulings in Rome.

Praetorium
(Latin) house in a Roman fort for a unit`s commander and his family.

Prandium
(Latin) in Rome, lunch; a light midday meal that might consist of bread, marinated vegetables, cheeses, hard boiled eggs, salads, cured hams, and salami; in Rome, consuming a large lunch was considered vulgar.

Presocratics
Greek philosophers of whom some preceded, and others were contemporary with Socrates.

Priam
son of Laomedon; fought the Amazons; husband of Hecuba, king of Troy and father of Hektor (Iliad and Aeneid); killed by Neoptolemus at the tomb of Achilles.

Principia
(Latin) building for the administrative offices of a Roman fort; the principia could hold records, storerooms and the soldiers` pay.

Proagon
preliminary announcement by playwright of plays to be performed at a given ancient Greek festival.

Proaulia
(Latin) in ancient Greece, the day before the wedding ceremony; on the proaulia a ceremony and feast would be held at the house of the bride's father; the bride would make various offerings, proteleia to different gods; the offerings would generally include her childhood clothing and toys; sacrifices to Artemis, goddess of virginity and of transition, would likely include locks of hair and zemia, a fine or penalty, in the hope that she would ease the bride's passage from virginity; the bride and groom would both make offerings to Aphrodite for a fruitful, child-rearing life.

Procursus
(Latin) literally a running forward, taken to mean an attack or charge in military terms.

Profundum
(Latin) the sea, an abyss.

Prokynesis
a Persian custom that entailed prostrating oneself before someone of higher rank; Alexander the Great required prokynesis as of 327 BCE, a move that pleased the Persians but caused great unhappiness among the Greeks and especially Macedonians who fought for him.

Prologue
the opening in ancient tragedy and comedy, usually in the form of a soliloquy or a dialogue; a way to convey the dramatic setting and situation of the play and introduce the background of the main characters .

Pronuba
(Latin) in ancient Roman wedding ceremononies, a married woman who had only been married once and whose husband was alive the incarnation of the faithful wife and thus auspicious; following the wedding ceremony, the pronuba led the bride into the bedroom and prayed with the bride for a blessing on the marriage, helped her undress, and remove her jewelry and then put her into the bed; then the groom entered, either alone or escorted by others and the pronuba would offer a sacrifice and leave.

Propertius
Roman poet; Propertius is best known for writing love poetry; his first two books consist mostly of love poems; he directed much of his poetry to a woman he names as Cynthia, although it is not known who Cynthia was supposed to be.

Prorogatio Imperii
(Latin) the continuation of an office or authority, used for the first time in 326 BCE in order to extend the consulship of Q. Publilius Philo; prorogatio imperii could be declared for consuls (pro consul), praetors (pro praetore), and quaestors (pro quaestore).

Prorsa Postverta
Roman goddess of women in labor.

Proscaenium
(Latin) the theater`s stage.

Protagonist
the leading character or hero in ancient Greek tragedy; in modern literary criticism, the central character in a drama or another genre.

Prothesis Scene
an iconographical scene where mourners surround the body of a dead person.

Proto-Corinthian
a style of ancient pottery decoration used during the period of 720 BCE to 690 BCE, that preceded Corinthian period.

Protome
a depiction of the fore part of an animal's body.

Provoco
(Latin) to defy.

Psaltria
(Latin) a woman who plays the cithara.

Psykter
a vase with a bulbous top and stemmed bottom.

Ptah
the ancient Egyptian god of architects and skilled craftsmen; Ptah`s wife was the lioness-goddess Sekhmet and his son was said to be either Imhotep or Nefertem; by thinking them with his mind and saying them with his tongue, Ptah brought all things into being.

Ptolemy
the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt lasted from 323 BCE to 116 BCE.

Puer
(Latin) boy or child in general.

Pugnus
(Latin) fight, fist.

Pullus
(Latin) animals when they are young, especially in relation to chickens and birds.

Pulmentum
(Latin) a sauce that one eats with bread.

Puls
(Latin) a porridge made from ground wheat that could be used as the main meal of the Roman day.

Punic Wars
a series of wars between Rome and Carthage over the control of land, especially of Sicily; the first Punic War lasted from 264-146 BCE and ended with the Romans having control of Sicily; the Second Punic War took place between 218-201 BCE, was led by Hannibal, and ended in Roman victory again; the Third Punic War began in 149 and ended in 146 BCE; at the end of the Third Punic War, Carthage was completely destroyed, its population was sold and the land became the Roman Africa province.

Purpureus
(Latin) purple; this word refers to anything purplish.

Pyre
a pile of wood or other combustible materials on which a body is burned in a cremation ritual.

Pythagoreanism
a philosophy influenced by the work of Pythagoras; the philosophy, based on mathematical and numerical theories, also promoted a strict vegetarianism.

Pythia
a woman who served at the Delphic Oracle for life; inspired by the god Apollo, she would prophecy; the Delphic oracles would often be ambiguous and easy to misunderstand.

Pyxis
a round vase used for storage of cosmetics.

Quadriga
(Latin) a two-wheeled chariot drawn by four horses.

Quaestor
(Latin) the lowest level Roman magistrate, responsible for the treasury and public prosecution of criminal offenses; in 509 BCE, with a minimum age of 28, two quaestors were appointed by the Roman consuls, but in 448 BCE the two quaestors were elected by the tribal assembly; late in the second century BCE, four quaestors were elected, two in Rome overseeing the treasury and two in the field with the consuls as quartermasters; added to their fiduciary responsibilities were tax collecting and recruiting in the Roman provinces; in 82 BCE, following the dictatorship of Sulla, the minimum age was raised to 30, a quaestor automatically became a member of the senate, and the number of quaestors was increased to 20; the number of quaestors would top out at 40 under Julius Caesar in 45 BCE, with the emperor Augustus returning the number to 20; under the Roman empire, the quaestor's financial duties were assumed by imperial magistrates; the quaestorship would eventually become an honorary position.

Quercus
(Latin) oak tree.

Quero
(Latin) to seek to know, to search for, to want.

Quies
(Latin) quiet, peace, rest.

Quinquiplico
(Latin) to multiply by five.

Quis
(Latin) who (interrogative pronoun).

Quomodo
(Latin) in what manner?; How?

Quoniam
(Latin) since, because.

Ratis
(Latin noun) a vessel or boat made of logs fastened together like a raft.

Re
Re was ancinet Egyptian god of the sun and was associated with Horus, the god of the sky; Re was known as the creator of men by some and became the state deity during the Fifth Dynasty; an ancient god, Re was the father of Shu and Tefnut, the grandfather of Geb and Nut, the great-grandfather of Seth, Nephthys, Isis, and Osiris.

Recito
(Latin) to read something aloud, to recite.

Recordatio
(Latin) remembrance; Cicero often mentions in his letters to his friends different recordationes

Recordor
(Latin) to remember, to think over.

Relaxatio
(Latin) relaxation.

Reminiscor
(Latin) to remember.

Remus
(Latin) oar; while the most popular ship was a trireme (with three sets of oars), there were also biremis (ships with two sets of oars), quadremis (four sets of oars) and quinqueremis (five sets of oars).

Remus
son of Mars and Rhea Silvia, twin brother of Romulus, exposed at birth in a basket floated on the Tiber River and washed a shore under a fig tree; the twins were suckled by a she-wolf.

Repotia
(Latin) essentially a party that follows the original entertainment.

Reproba
(Latin) false.

Responsa
(Latin) a significant development in the Roman justice system introduced by Augustus and his successors; a responsa was an opinion on a legal case heard in court by eminent jurists; jurists earned fame based on their responsa; famous jurists include Papinian, Julius Paulus, and Ulpian, all of whom held the position of praefectus praetoria, minister of justice of the Roman Empire.

Reverse
the side of a coin on which the minor design appears; the tails side.

Rex
(Latin) king; the term rex is tied to the Latin verb rego, to rule.

Rhabdos
a stick used by ancient Greek athletic trainers to maintain discipline.

Rhea Silvia
a woman from Roman legend; mother of Romulus and Remus; she was raped by Mars and became pregnant with twins; the twins were taken from her when they were newly born and left exposed because the children of Rhea Silvia were predicated to overthrow their grandfather.

Rhetor
(Latin) teacher of rhetoric.

Rhetoric
the effective use of language; the art of persuasion.

Rhyton
a drinking cup shaped like an animal horn.

Rogo
(Latin) to ask for

Romanization
a process through which areas conquered by or added to the Roman Empire became more like Rome and through which Rome spread its influence; this process took place in many different ways, such as through the adoption of legal and administrative processes, the spread of the Latin language, the erection of Roman-style buildings and monuments and the spread of Roman religion; Romanization did not require that newly added regions take on only Roman characteristics; the Roman Empire incorporated parts of others' cultures also, but Romanization is the process by which other cultures became 'Roman'.

Roseus
(Latin) rosy/pink; this word was often used to describe the color of dawn, and Lucretius used it in this way in his De Rerum Natura.

Rostrum
(Latin) literally a beak; through metonymy, the rostrum takes on the meaning of the prow of the ship.

Rubor
(Latin) redness.

Rumina
Roman goddess of nursing mothers.

Rural Dionysia
a smaller celebration of the City Dionysia that is held in various cities throughout the countryside; like in the City Dionysia, there were competitions of comedies, tragedies and poetry; the Acharnians by Aristophanes refers to the Rural Dionysia.

Rus
(Latin) the countryside

Rusticus
(Latin) peasant/farmer; the rusticus was a man who lived in the countryside, the rus.

Ruta
(Latin) the herb rue; comes to mean bitterness or unpleasantness.

Sacerdos
(Latin) priest; this word is related to the word sacer, which means sacred; there were many different colleges of priests or sacerdotes, and each had different requirements for entry and roles to play in religious rites.

Saeta Equine
(Latin) horsehair.

Sagino
(Latin) to fatten.

Saguntum
a Mediterranean seaport town in Spain on the Palencia River, in Valencia; an ally of Rome in 221 BCE against Hannibal and the Carthaginians; it was besieged by Hannibal from 219-218 BCE, then captured; in 214, the Romans recaptured Saguntum and made it a Roman municipium.

Sakkos (Saccos)
a sack or bag.

Salacia
a Roman water goddess; she was one of the wives of Neptune; she is thought to be connected to the Greek water goddess Amphitrite.

Salii
(Latin) literally the dancers; an Italian priesthood that honored the Roman god Mars.

Salus (Latin)
health or well-being, both in terms of physical health and also in terms of welfare.

Salutarius (Latin)
healthy, physically well.

Saluto
(Latin) to greet, to pay respect to.

Samnites
the Samnites lived in southern Italy; they fought two wars with Rome over territory; the first Samnite War took place between 343 and 341 BCE and the Second Samnite War lasted from 372-321 and 316-304 BCE; the Third Samnite War ended in 290 BCE; the Samnites suffered a loss at Aquilon in 293 BCE; they also fought in the Social War; Romanization caught hold in Samnium under Augustus after which some Samnites began to have more political power in Rome.

Sanus (Latin)
healthy, uninjured; this adjective can refer to being either physically or mentally healthy.

Sappho
Greek lyric poet and one of the few known female poets of the ancient world; born ca. 630 BCE to Skamandronymos (father) and Kleis (mother); she was of aristocrat birth and married a prosperous merchant, Kerhylas of Andros; she had a daughter named Kleis; Sappho lived in the city of Mytilene on the island of Lesbos; Sappho's poetry is concerned with personal relationships, specifically the love of women; her poetry influenced the works of other ancient poets, including Catullus and Ovid.

Sarpedon
son of Poseidon, a giant killed by Herakles; (2) Lykian hero and ally of the Trojans said to by the son of Zeus, killed by Patroklus (Iliad).

Satire
a literary work which belittles or savagely attacks its subject. A distinction is sometimes made between direct and indirect satire.

Satrap
a Persian title that literally means 'protector of power'; satraps were essentially administrative governors, ruling a satrapy; some of Alexander the Great's generals became satraps after Alexander's death and the dissolution of Alexander's empire.

Saturn
old Italian god identified with the Greek god Cronus; after being hurled from Olympus by Jupiter, he established the future site of Rome and founded a village there called Saturnia; Saturn ruled Latium during its Golden Age and he taught the people how to cultivate the land; the Romans celebrated the festival Saturnalia at the end of December during which the social order was inverted, e.g., slaves gave orders to their masters.