A dictionary of Greek and Roman . en rulers [Regula] of equal thickness,one of them being two feet ten inches long, theothers each two feet long, and joining them to-gether by their extremities so as to assume theform of a right-angled triangle. (Isid. Orig. ) This method, though only a close approxi-mation, must have been quite sufficient for all com-mon purposes. For the sake of convenience, thelongest side, i. e. the hypotenuse of the triangle,was discarded, and the instrument then assumedthe form, in which it is exhibited among othertools in woodcut at p. 283. A square
A dictionary of Greek and Roman . en rulers [Regula] of equal thickness,one of them being two feet ten inches long, theothers each two feet long, and joining them to-gether by their extremities so as to assume theform of a right-angled triangle. (Isid. Orig. ) This method, though only a close approxi-mation, must have been quite sufficient for all com-mon purposes. For the sake of convenience, thelongest side, i. e. the hypotenuse of the triangle,was discarded, and the instrument then assumedthe form, in which it is exhibited among othertools in woodcut at p. 283. A square of a stillmore simple fashion, made \>y merely cutting arectangular piece out of a board, is shown on an-other sepulchral monument, found at Rome andpublished by Gruter (1. c. p. 229), and copied inthe woodcut which is here introduced. The squarewas used in making the semicircular striae of Ioniccolumns [Columna], a method founded on theproposition in Euclid, that the angle contained ina semicircle is a right angle (Vitruv. iii. 5. § 14).. JNSTRVMEN . TABR . TIGKAR. From the use of this instrument a right anglewas also called a normal angle. (Quintil. xi. 3. , ed. Spalding.) Any thing mis-shapen wascalled abnormis. (Hor. Sat. ii. 2. 3.) [J. Y.] NOTA, which signified a mark or sign of anykind, was also employed for an notae signified the marks or signs used intaking down the words of a speaker, and wasequivalent to our short-hand writing, or steno-graphy ; and notarii signified short-hand must be borne in mind, however, that notae also signified writing in cipher; and many passages inthe ancient reciters which are supposed to referto short-hand, refer in reality to writing in both Julius Caesar and Augustus wrote manyof their letters in cipher {per notas, Suet. 56, Aug. 88 ; comp. Gell. xvii. 9). Stillshort-hand was well known and extensively em-ployed. Among the Greeks it is said to havebeen invented by Xenophon (Dio
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Keywords: ., bookauthorsmithwilliam18131893, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1840
