Smith, William: A smaller dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities (London, 1871)

PA11EXTALIA.

285

PATERA.

objects of having assessors must have been to dish or plate, on which such food was served
enable them to get through their business. | up, and it is in this latter signification that the

From the paredri of the archons we must
distinguish those who assisted the euthyni in
examining and auditing magistrates' ac-
counts.

PARENTALIA. [Funus.]

PARIES. [Domvs.]

PARMA, dim. PARMTJLA, a round shield,
three feet in diameter, carried by the relites
in the Roman army. Though small, com-

rarma. (From the Columna Trajana.)

Roman writers use the word.

PARRICIUA, PARRICIDIUM. A parri-
cida signified originally a murderer gene-
rally, and is hence defined to be a person
who kills another dolo malo. It afterwards
signified the murderer of a parent, and by an
ancient law such a parricide was sewed up
in a sack [culleus), and thrown into a river.
A law of the dictator Sulla contained some
provisions against parricide, and probably
fixed the same punishment for the parricide,
as the Lex Pompeia de Parricidiis, passed in
the time of Cn. Pompeius. This law ex-
tended the crime of parricide to the killing
of a brother, sister, uncle, aunt, and many
other relations, and enacted that he who
killed a father or mother, grandfather or
grandmother, should be punished [more ma-
jorum) by being whipped till he bled, sewed
| up in a sack with a dog, cock, viper, and
ape, and thrown into the sea. Other parri-
cides were simply put to death.

PASSUS, a measure of length, which con-
sisted of five Roman feet. [Pes.] The
passus was not the step, or distance from
heel to heel, when the feet were at their
utmost ordinary extension, but the distance
from the point which the heel leaves to that
i in which it is set down. The mille passuum,
or thousand paces, was the common name of
the Roman mile. [Milliaee.]

PATER FAMILIAE. [Familia ; Matri-

monium.]

PATER PATRATUS. [Fetiales.]
PATERA, dim. PATELLA (0ioAt|), a
round plate or dish. The paterae of the
most common kind were small plates of the

pared with the Ci.ipevs, it was so strongly
made as to be a very effectual protection.
This was probably owing to the use of iron
in its frame-work. The parma was also
worn by the cavalry. We find the term
parma often applied to the target [Cetra],
which was also a small round shield,
and therefore very similar to the
parma.

PAROCIII, certain people paid by
the state to supply the Roman magis-
trates, ambassadors, and other official
persons, when travelling, with those
necessaries which they could not con-
veniently carry with them. They ex-
isted on all the principal stations on
the Roman roads in Italy and the
provinces, where persons were accus-
tomed to pass the night. Of the things
which the parochi were bound to sup-
ply, hay, fire-wood, salt, and a certain
number of beds appear to have been
the most important.

PAROPSIS (™Po>pU\ any food .^e^;^^^
eaten with the o\f/ov, as the n«i"a, a
kind of frumenty or soft cake, broth, ^^MKWW
or any kind of condiment or sauce. r*—^—J-ll-sL-L-_^

It was, likewise, the name of the Patera. (From Pompcno