Altar of Julius Victor. (Bartoli, Pict. Ant., p. 76.)
CORNU, a wind instrument, anciently made of horn, but afterwards of brass. Like the tuba, it differed from the tibia in being a larger and more powerful instrument, and from the tuba itself, in being curved nearly in the shape of a C, with a cross-piece to steady the instrument for the convenience of the performer. Hence Ovid says (Met. i. 98):
“Non tuba directi, non aeris cornua flexi.”
The classicum, which originally meant a signal, rather than the musical instrument which gave the signal, was usually sounded with the cornu.
“Sonuit reflexo classicum cornu,
Lituusque adunco stridulos cantus
Elisit aere.”
(Sen. Oed. 734.)
The Cornicines and Liticines, the persons who blew the Cornu and Lituus, formed a collegium. In the preceding cut, M. Julius Victor, a member of the Collegium, holds a lituus in his right hand, and touches with his left a cornu on the ground. See engraving under [Tuba].