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

PILAUSTRUM. PLEBES. 923
Saturnumque gravem nostro Jove frangimus una. woodcut, and in the sculptures on the arch of
Pers. v. 48. Septimius Severus at Rome. Although these
Te Joxvis impie - wheels were excellent for keeping the roads ill
Tutela Saturno refulgens repair and did not cut up the fields, yet they
Eripuit. rendered it necessary to take a long circuit in
Her. Cares. ii. 16. 22. turning.. They advanced slowly. (Virg. Geosp. i.
138.) They also made a loud creaking, which
It must be understood that in the above remarks, was heard to a great distance (stridentia plsaustra,
we have confined ourselves entirely to the popular Virg. Georg. iii. 536; gementia, Aen. xi. 138).
notions which prevailed among the ancients with- Their rude construction made them liable to bee
out attempting to trace the progress of scientific overturned with their load of stone, timber, manure,
observation, a subject which belongs to a formal or skins of wine (Juv. iii. 241-243), whence thehistory of astronomy, but does not fall within our Emperor Hadrian prohibited heavily loaded waglimits. (Plut. de Placitis Philos. ii. 14, 15, 16; gons from entering the city of Rome. (Spartian.
Stob. Ecl. Phys. i. 23. ~ 1, 25. ~ I; Diogen. Laert. fHadr. 22.) The waggoner was sometimes required
viii. 14, ix. 23; Arat. Phaen. 454; Gemini Ele- to aid the team with his shoulder. Accidents of
mnenta Ast-ron. c. 1; Achill. Tat. Isag. ad Asrat. this kind gave origin to the proverb " Plaustrum
PPhcen. xvii.; Lydus, De Mens. v. &c.; Cic. de perculi," meaning " I have had a misfortune."
Nat. Deor. ii. 20; Plin. H. N. ii. 6. 8; Tac. Ilist. (Plaut. Epid. iv. 2. 22.) Carts of this description,
v. 4; Macrob. Soens. Scip. 4.) [W. R.] having solid wheels without spokes, are still used
PLA'STICA. [STATUARIA.] in Greece (Dodwell's Tour, vol. ii. pp. 102, 103)
PLJAUSTRUM or PLOSTRUM. dimz. PLOS- and in some parts of Asia. (Sir R. K. Porter's
TELLU.M (&tuaSa, dint. aeuaest), a cart or waggon. Tr vels, vol. ii. p. 533.) EJ. Y.]
This vehicle had commonly two wheels, but some- PLEBE'II LUDI. [LUDI PLEBEII.]
times four, and it was then called the plaustr'uis PLEBES or PLEBS. PLEBEII. This word
Ameus. The invention of four-wheeled waggons is contains the same root as im-pleo, comsi-pleo, &c.,
attributed to the Phrygians. (Plin. II. N. vii. 56.) and is therefore etymologically connected with
Besides the wheels and axle the plaustrum con- IrArXios, a term which was applied to the plebeians
sisted of a strong pole (tezmo), to the hinder part of by the more correct Greek writers on Roman hiswhich was fastened a table of wooden planks. tory, while others wrongly called them i,1tos or ol
The blocks of stone, or other things to be carried, a8r71OTriCO.
were either laid upon this table without any other The plebeians were the body of commons or the
support, or an additional security was obtained commonalty of Rome, and thus constituted one of
by the use either of boards at the sides (7rmpreepia, - the two great elements of which the Roman nation
Heom. Od. vi. 70; Plato, Theaet. p. 467, Heindorf.) consisted, and which has given to the earlier periods
or of a large wicker basket tied upon the cart of Roman history its peculiar character and in(reipLvr, Hoem. I. xxiv. 267, Od. xv. 131). The terest. Before the time of Niebuhr the most in.
annexed woodcut, taken from a bas-relief at Rome, consistent notions were entertained by scholars with
exhibits a cart, the body of which is supplied by a regard to the plebeians and their relations to the
basket. Similar vehicles are still used in many patricians; and it is one of his peculiar merits to
parts of Europe, being employed more especially have pointed out the real position which they octo carry charcoal. cupied in the history of Rome.
The ancients themselves do not agree respecting
the time when the plebeians began to form a part' of the Roman population. Dionysius and Livy
represent them as having formed a part of the Roi? I1A s eamrly as the time of Romulus, and sene
to consider them as the clients of the patricians, or
/~'/';!as the low multitude of outcasts who flocked to
I9/'l. Rome at the time when Romulus opened the asylum. (Dionys. i. 8; Liv. i. 8.) If there is any'-= >I, =:im truth at all in these accounts of the early existence
of the plebeians, we can only conceive them to
- Am__-,y__~.....~........have been the original inhabitants of the districts
occupied by the new settlers (Ramnes or Romans),
In many cases, though not universally, the who, after their territory was conquered, were kept
wheels were fastened to the axle, which moved, as in that state of submission in which conquered nain our children's carts, within wooden rings adapt- tions were so frequently held in early times.
ed for its reception and fastened to the body. There are also some other statements referring to
These rings were called in Greek &/.aMo7roGes, in such an early existence of the plebeians; for the
Latin alsbusculae. The parts of the axis, which re- clients, in the time of Romulus, are said to have
volved within them, were sometimes cased with been formed out of the plebeians. (Dionys. ii. 9;
iron. (Vitruv. x. 20. ~ 14.) The commonest kind Plut. Roiesul. 13; Cic. d Re Re Publ. ii. 9; Fest.
of cart-wheel was that called tfynpcaonu7s, " the s. v. Patrocinia.) In the early times of Romre the
drum," from its resemblance to the musical instrt- position of a client was in many respects undoubtment of the same name. (Varro, de Re Rust. iii. 5; edly far more favourable than that of a plebeian,
Virg. Georg. ii. 444.) It was nearly a foot in and it is not improbable that some of the plebeians
thickness, and was made either by sawing the may for this reason have entered into the relation
trunk of a tree across in an horizontal direction, or of clientela to some patricians, and have given up
by nailing together boards of the requisite shape the rights which they had as free plebeians; and
and size. It is exemplified in the preceding occurrences of this kind may have given rise to the