Dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

SAGITTA. SAGITTA. 1001
inature,-that is, either civil or natural. The civil XaAxjpns, "fitted with bronze," which Ilomer
saeculum, according to the calculation of the Etrus- applies to an arrow. (II. xiii. 650, 662.) Another
cans, which was adopted by the Romans, was a IIomeric epithet, viz. "three-tongued " (-rplybXyiv
space of time containing ] 10 lunar years. The 1I. v. 393), is illustrated by the forms of the arrownatural saeculum, upon the calculation of which heads, all of bronze, which are represented in the
the formier was founded, expressed the longest annexed woodcut. That which lies horizontally
term of human life, and its duration or length was
ascertained according to the ritual books of the
Etruscans, in the following manner: the life of _
person, which lasted the longest ofall those who
were born on the day of the foundation of a town,
constituted the first saeeulunm of that town; nund
the longest lvTer of all who were born at-the time
when the second saeculum began, again determined
the duration of the second sacculum, and so on.
(Censorin. de Die Nat. 17.) In the same manner
that the Etruscans thus called the longest life of a
nian a saeculn m, so they called the lonTest existence of a state, or the space of 1100 years, a sace-
cular day; the longest existence of one human
race, or the space of 8800 years, a saecular week,
&c. (Plut. Sulla, 7; Niebuhr, li.it. of' Rome, i.
p. 137.) It was believed that the return of a new
raeculurn was marked by various wonders anod
signs, which were recorded in the.history of the was found at Persepolis, and is drawn of the size
Etruscans. The return of each saeculum at Rome of the origiinal. The two smallest, one of oIiicll
-was announced by the pontiffs, who also made the shows a rivet-hole at the side for fastening it to
necessary inltercalations in such a manner, that at the shaft, are from the plain of Marathon. (Skelton,
the commencement of a new saeculnmn the begin- Illust. of AArmour tt Goodrich Court, i. pl. 44.)
iiing of the ten nlonths' year, of the twelve months' The fourth specimen was also found in Attica.
year, and of the solar year coincided. But in (Dodwell, 1. c.) Some of the northern nations,
these arrangements the greatest arbitrariness and who could not obtain iron,'barbed their arrowirregularity appears to have prevailed at Rome, as heads with bone. (Tacit. Germ. 46.)
may be seen from the unqqual intervals at which The use of barbed (cadnctse, /aseaztae), and poithe lutdi saeculares were celebrated. [LuDr SAE- soned arrows (renennate sacittae) is always repreCULARES.] This also accounts for the various sented by the Greek and Roman authors as the
ways in which a saeculum was defined by the an- characteristic of barbarous nations. It is attricients: some believed that it contained thirty buted to the Sauromatae lad Getae (Ovid. Trist.
(Censorin. 1. c.), and others that it contained a iii. 10. 63, 64, de P'o2to, iv. 7. 11, 12); to the
hundred years (Varro, de Ling. Lat. vi. 11; Fest. Servii (Arnoldi, C/Iron. Slav. 4. ~ 8) and Scythians
s. v. Saeceslares ludi); the latter opinion appears (Plin. II. AN x. 53. s. 115), and to the Arabs
to have been the most common in later times, so (Pollulx, i. 10) and Moors. (-Ior. Ctarl. i. 2-2. 3.)
that saeculum answered to our century. (See When Ulysses wishes to have recourse to this in-.
Niebuhr, Ilist. of'Rome, i. p. 275, &c.) [L. S.] sidious practice, he is obliged to travel north of tihe
SAGA'RII, the sellers or makers of the saoga country of the Thesprotians (IHom. Od. i. 261or soldiers' cloaks. [SAGITa.] They formed a col- 263); and the classical authors who mention it
legium at Rome, and, like many of the other trade- do so in terms of condemnation. (Hom. Plin.
corporations, worshipped the imperial family, as 1l. cc.; Aelian, II. A. v. 1 6.) The poison applied
we see from inscriptions. (Dig. 14. tit. 4. s. 5. ~ 15; to the tips of arrows having been called toxic-m
1 7. tit. 2. s. 52. ~ 4; -and the inscription in A. W. ('rostcbv), on account of its conlnection with the
Zumpt, De Asgpusstalibsss, Berol. 1846, p. 17.) use of the bow (Plin. II. N. xvi. 10. s. 20 Festls,
SAGITTA (oiFT&, i's; Herod.'dTev~ta), an s. v.; Dioscor. vi. 20), the signification of this term
arrow. The account of the arrows of Hercules -was afterwards extended to poisons in general.
(Hesiod, Scust. 130-135), enumerates and de- (Plalt. l3erc. ii. 4. 4; Hor. JEplod. xvii. 61
scribes three parts, viz. the head or point, the Propert. i. 5. 6.)
shaft, and the feather. II. The excellence of the shaft consisted in
I. The hlad was denominated apals (I-Ierod. i. being long and at the same time straigsht, and, it
215, iv. 81), whence the instrument, used to ex. it was of light wood, in being well polished. (Hes.
tract arrow-heads from the bodies of the wounded, Scut. 133.) But it often consisted of a smooth
was called a&pdsoOpa. [FoacEPs.] Great quan- cane or reed (Alundo doiax or /sAragizites, Linn. ),
tities of flint arrow heads are found in Celtic bar- and on this account the whole arrow was called
rows throughout the north of Europe, in form ex- either arunzdo in the one case (Virr. Aen. iv. 69actly resembling those which are still used by the 73, v. 525; Ovid. ]I'fet. i. 471, viii. 382), or
indians of North America. (Hoare's Anc. Wilt- calamus in the other. (Virg. Biec. iii. 12, 13; Ovid.
shire, Soouth, p. 183.) Nevertheless, the Scythians SAlet. vii. 778; Hor. Caet-n. i. 15. 17; Jnv. xiii..and Massagetae had them of bronze. (Herod. 1l. cc.) 80.) In the Egyptian tombs reed-arrows hlave been
Mr. Dodwell found flint arrow-heads on the plain found, varying from 34 to 22 inches in length.
of Marathon, and concludes that they had be- They showv the slit (yAvqis, tHom. II. iv. 122,
longed to the Persian army. (Tour? t/rousgs Greece, Od. xxi. 419) cut in the reed for fixinlg it upon
vol. ii. p. 1.59.) Those used by the Greeks were the string. (Wilkinson, 11In. and Cust. &c. vol. a.
comlmonly bronze, as is expressed by the epithet p 309.)