SCALPTŪRA or SCULPTŪRA, originally signified cutting figures out of a solid material, but was more particularly applied to the art of cutting figures into the material (intaglios), which was chiefly applied to producing seals and matrices for the mints; and 2. the art of producing raised figures (cameos), which served for the most part as ornaments. Sculpture in our sense of the word was usually designated by the term [Statuaria]. The first artist who is mentioned as an engraver of stones is Theodoras, the son of Telecles, the Samian, who engraved the stone in the ring of Polycrates. The most celebrated among them was Pyrgoteles, who engraved the seal-rings for Alexander the Great. Several of the successors of Alexander and other wealthy persons adopted the custom of adorning their gold and silver vessels, craters, candelabras, and the like, with precious stones on which raised figures (cameos) were worked. The art was in a particularly flourishing state at Rome under Augustus and his successors, in the hands of Dioscurides and other artists, many of whose works are still preserved. Numerous specimens of intaglios and cameos are still preserved in the various museums of Europe.
SCAMNUM, dim. SCĂBELLTUM, a step which was placed before the beds of the ancients in order to assist persons in getting into them, as some were very high: others which were lower required also lower steps, which were called scabella. A scamnum was also used as a footstool. A scamnum extended in length becomes a bench, and in this sense the word is frequently used. The benches in ships were sometimes called scamna.
SCĒNA. [[Theatrum].]
SCEPTRUM (σκῆπτρον), which originally denoted a simple staff or walking-stick, was emblematic of station and authority. In ancient authors the sceptre is represented as belonging more especially to kings, princes, and leaders of tribes: but it is also borne by judges, by heralds, and by priests and seers. The sceptre descended from father to son, and might be committed to any one in order to express the transfer of authority. Those who bore the sceptre swore by it, solemnly taking it in the right hand and raising it towards heaven. The ivory sceptre of the kings of Rome, which descended to the consuls, was surmounted by an eagle.
SCHOENUS (ὁ, ἡ, σχοῖνος), an Egyptian and Persian measure, the length of which is stated by Herodotus at 60 stadia, or 2 parasangs. It was used especially for measuring land.
SCORPĬO. [[Tormentum].]
SCRĪBAE, public notaries or clerks, in the pay of the Roman state. They were chiefly employed in making up the public accounts, copying out laws, and recording the proceedings of the different functionaries of the state. The phrase scriptum facere was used to denote their occupation. Being very numerous, they were divided into companies or classes (decuriae), and were assigned by lot to different magistrates, whence they were named Quaestorii, Aedilicii, or Praetorii, from the officers of state to whom they were attached. The appointment to the office of a “scriba” seems to have been either made on the nomination of a magistrate, or purchased. Horace, for instance, bought for himself a “patent place as clerk in the treasury” (scriptum quaestorium comparavit). In Cicero’s time, indeed, it seems that any one might become a scriba or public clerk by purchase, and consequently, as freedmen and their sons were eligible, and constituted a great portion of the public clerks at Rome, the office was not highly esteemed, though frequently held by ingenui or free-born citizens. Very few instances are recorded of the scribae being raised to the higher dignities of the state. Cn. Flavius, the scribe of Appius Claudius, was raised to the office of curule aedile in gratitude for his making public the various forms of actions, which had previously been the exclusive property of the patricians [[Actio]]; but the returning officer refused to acquiesce in his election till he had given up his books and left his profession.
SCRĪNĬUM. [[Capsa].]
SCRIPTA DUŎDĔCIM. [[Latrunculi].]
SCRIPTŪRA, that part of the revenue of the Roman Republic which was derived from letting out, as pasture land, those portions of the ager publicus which were not taken into cultivation. The names for such parts of the ager publicus were, pascua publica, saltus, or silvae. They were let by the censors to the publicani, like all other vectigalia; and the persons who sent their cattle to graze on such public pastures had to pay a certain tax or duty to the publicani, which of course varied according to the number and quality of the cattle which they kept upon them. The publicani had to keep the lists of persons who sent their cattle upon the public pastures, together with the number and quality of the cattle. From this registering (scribere) the duty itself was called scriptura, the public pasture land ager scripturarius, and the publicani, or their agents who raised the tax, scripturarii. The Lex Thoria (B.C. 111) did away with the scriptura in Italy, where the public pastures were very numerous and extensive, especially in Apulia, and the lands themselves were now sold or distributed. In the provinces, where the public pastures were also let out in the same manner, the practice continued until the time of the empire; but afterwards the scriptura is no longer mentioned.