Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Pinna

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. 

PINNA (πτερόν). The blade of a rudder (gubernaculum): which among the ancients was little more than a large oar having a broad blade at the extremity, with two drooping points, like the feather ends of birds' wings, from which it received the name, as in the annexed example (Pinna/1.1), from a bas-relief found at Pozzuoli. If the blade was rounded at the bottom like a common oar, as was frequently the case, it still retained the same name; but the resemblance was drawn from a single feather, which has the quill in the centre, and, as it were, a blade with an edge on each side of it, like a double axe. Non. s. Bipennis, p. 79.

2. A turret, or notched battlement, along the top of a wall, fortress, tower, &c. (Varro, L. L. v. 142. Claud. Quadrig. ap. Gell. ix. 1. Virg. Aen. vii. 159). Some grammarians deduce this meaning of the word from a fancied resemblance to the feathers or wings worn by the Samnite soldiers and gladiators at the sides of their helmets (see the illustration s. SAMNITES); others from the turret being acuminated or bevelled upwards into an edge, like a feather, in the manner shown by the annexed illustration (Pinna/2.1), which represents two turrets on the city walls of Pompeii, viewed from the inside of the ramparts. It will also be observed that they are ingeniously contrived with a shoulder, or returning angle, which protected the defenders from missiles coming with a slant against their left sides.

3. A paddle or float board attached to the outside of a water wheel (rota aquaria), upon which the current acts to produce rotation. Vitruv. x. 5. 1.

4. A register or stop in a water organ. Vitruv. x. 8. 4.

• 
  Pinna/1.1
• 
  Pinna/2.1