lituus

From Latin

lituus (plural litui)

1. A military trumpet.
   • 1786: Fig. 3. A Roman Lituus, or military trumpet, such as is mentioned by Horace in his first ode. — Francis Grose, A Treatise on Ancient Armour and Weapons, page vi.
2. An augur's staff with a recurved top.
3. (geometry) A curve with polar equation ${\displaystyle r^{2}\theta =a^{2}}$ , where a is a constant.

• lituate
• lituiform

• Mathworld article on the geometrical lituus

From Etruscan or from Proto-Indo-European *(e)lAi- (“to bend”)[1]. Compare English lith and German Glied (“limb”).

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈli.tu.us/, [ˈlɪ.tʊ.ʊs]

lituus m (genitive lituī); second declension

1. a military trumpet
2. a curved staff

Second declension.

• liticen

• lituus in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• lituus in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• lituus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Hachette
• lituus in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898) Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• lituus in William Smith et al., editor (1890) A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin