Cella
1.
In its primary sense,
cella means a store-room, of which the following
were the principal descriptions:
cella penaria or penuaria, where all
kinds of provisions (
penus) were stored, especially those of which a
stock was laid in for a long time;
cella promptuaria, promptuarium, or
promum, the larder, where meat and other things required for
immediate consumption were kept;
cella olearia, the magazine of an
olive-yard in which the oil was stored, and which, according to the treatises on farming,
ought to be lighted from the south, that the oil might not be chilled in winter; while the
cella vinaria should have a northern aspect, to avoid excessive heat
and great changes of temperature. The
cella vinaria described in the
ancient authors is the store-room of a vineyard, in which the new wine was kept in
dolia or
cupae, while older wine was put into
amphorae and matured in the
apotheca. The
cella vinaria was partly underground (Becker-Göll,
Gallus, iii. 51, 422). The
cella vinaria of a
wine-merchant was discovered in 1789 under the walls of Rome. It was raised a little above
the level of the ground, and divided into three compartments, the first ornamented with
arabesques and a mosaic pavement, the second unpaved and containing a row of very large
dolia two-thirds imbedded in sand, while the third was a narrow gallery, six
feet high and eighteen feet long, with various earthenware vessels, also partially sunk in
the sand and ranged in double rows against each wall. (See
Dolium.) The slave to whom the charge of these stores was intrusted was called
cellarius, a rationibus cellae, promus, promus condus, or
procurator peni; under him was the
subpromus.
2.
Any number of small rooms clustered together. Thus the word was applied to the dormitories
of slaves (
Hor. Sat. i. 8.8), to the bedrooms
of an inn, and to the
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Slave Cellae. (Rich.)
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vaults of a brothel (
Petron. 8, 4). A brothel is also called
cella inscripta, because
the price of each inmate was inscribed on the door (
Mart.xi.
45, 1). The porter's lodge or janitor's office is
called
cella ostiarii (
Petron. 29) or
cella ianitoris (
Vitell. 16).
3.
In the baths the
cella caldaria, tepidaria, and
frigidaria are respectively those which contained the hot, tepid, and cold baths. See
Balneae.
4.
The interior of a temple was also called
cella. See
Templum.
