LANX
LANX
1. A general term, including various forms of dishes different in shape and
use, but, as far as can be gathered, a large dish. It should have been
originally flat, according to Corssen's view that it is connected with
plancus, planus,
πλάξ,: but it was also deep (
cava,
Mart. 11.31) and, so far, like the
catinus. The epithet
panda applied to it in Virgil (
Georg. 2.194)
probably has the same meaning. In Hor.
Sat.
2.4, 40, it is round and large enough to hold a wild boar; but it is square
or quadrangular in Ulp.
Dig. 34, 2, 19. Ovid (
Ov. Pont. 3.5,
50) describes it as embossed (
caelata）
and holding fruit, but most frequently we find it used for bringing meat or
fish to the table (Hor.
l.c.;
Juv. 5.80; Plaut.
Curc. 323). It
is used for incense (
Ov. Pont. 4.8,
40;
Prop. 2.13,
23). Its use in sacrifices, both for the
exta and for incense, may be seen from
Verg. G.
2.194,
394;
Aen.
8.284, 13.215; Ov.
l.c. All passages which give any
indication of its material tend to prove that the lanx was always of metal;
for the rich, of silver (Hor.
Sat. 2.4, 40;
Plin. Nat. 33.145, where
lances are mentioned weighing from 100 to 500
pounds, and requiring a special
officina to
make them). In Cicero,
Cic. Att. 6.1,
13, the lanx embossed in filigree work (
filicata) is opposed to vasa fictilia; but that it
was made, if always of metal, sometimes of cheaper metal than silver, is
implied by its rustic use in Verg.
Georg. l.c. The following
lines from Ovid (
Ov. Pont. 4.8,
39,
40) are
instructive both as to size and relative cost:--
Nec quae de parva dis pauper libat acerra
Tura minus, grandi
quam data lance, valent:
and it is noticeable that Pliny (
l.c.),
speaking of very costly silver plate, uses the word
lanx, but in 35.163, when he speaks of pottery made at an
extravagant price, he uses the word
patina.
(Marquardt,
Privatl. 654;
CATINUS）
2. The metal dishes of the balance [
LIBRA] were called
lances, and
sometimes the word
lanx (==
libra bilanx) was used to express the balance: so Suet.
Vesp. 25;
Verg. A.
12.725, &c. (Becker-Göll,
Gallus, 2.367.)
[
J.Y] [
G.E.M]
