CŎPHĬNUS (κόφινος, Engl. _coffin_), a large kind of wicker basket,
made of willow branches. It would seem that it was used by the Greeks
as a basket or cage for birds. The Romans used it for agricultural
purposes, and it sometimes formed a kind of portable hot-bed.
Juvenal, when speaking of the Jews, uses the expression _cophinus et
foenum_ (a truss of hay), figuratively to designate their poverty.
CORBIS, _dim_. CORBŬLA, CORBĬCŬLA, a basket of very peculiar form
and common use among the Romans, both for agricultural and other
purposes. It was made of osiers twisted together, and was of a
conical or pyramidal shape. A basket answering precisely to this
description, both in form and material, is still to be seen in
every-day use among the Campanian peasantry, which is called in the
language of the country “la corbella.”
CORBĪTAE, merchantmen of the larger class, so called because they
hung out a _corbis_ at the mast-head for a sign. They were also
termed _onerariae_; and hence Plautus, in order to designate the
voracious appetites of some women, says, “Corbitam cibi comesse
possunt.”
[Illustration: Cornu. (Bartholini de Tibiis.)]
[Illustration: 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.
[Illustration: Corona Civica, on a Coin of the Emperor Galba.