Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Manus ferrea

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rich, Anthony (1849). The illustrated companion to the Latin dictionary, and Greek lexicon. p. vi. OCLC 894670115. https://archive.org/details/illustratedcompa00rich. 

MANUS FERREA (χεῖρ σιδηρᾶ). The iron-hand; a sort of grappling-iron, used especially in the navy for seizing hold upon the rigging or hull of another vessel, so as to lock the two together while one of the crews attempted to board. (Liv. xxvi. 39. xxxvi. 44. xxxvii. 30. Frontin. Strat. ii. 3. 24. Lucan. iii. 635.) This contrivance is sometimes confounded with the HARPAGO (Curt. iv. 2. 12.); but the two are distinctly mentioned as separate objects by Caesar (B. C. i. 57.), and by Pliny (H. N. vii. 57.), who ascribes the invention of the manus to Pericles, and of the harpago to Anacharsis. One, and perhaps the principal, point of difference consisted in this, that the manus was fastened to a chain, and discharged as a missile from an engine; so that it grappled a vessel at a certain distance, and took it in tow; or, when drawn in, brought it close up alongside (Curt. iv. 3. Lucan. iii. 375. Scheffer, Mil. Nav. ii. 7.); whereas the harpago was affixed to a long shaft or pole (asser), Liv. xxx. 10.