Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Pronuba

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. 

PRO'NUBA. A matron who had not been more than once married, who attended a bride on the day of her wedding, in a somewhat similar, though not the same, capacity as the bridesmaid does amongst us. It was her especial duty to conduct the bride, after the marriage-feast to the lectus genialis, and to give her encouragement and instructions respecting the new duties and condition of life she had just entered upon (Festus, s. v. Varro, ap. Serv. ad. Virg. Aen. iv. 166. Compare Catull. lxi. 186. and Stat. Sylv. i. 2. 11.); as is grapically shown in the illustration (Pronuba/1.1), from the celebrated Roman fresco, preserved in the Vatican, and known by the name of the "Aldobrandini marriage." The bride is the right-hand figure, still enveloped in her bridal veil (flammeum); the pronuba, the one on the left with a chaplet round her head, and in an attitude of persuasion or encouragement; both are sitting upon the marriage bed.

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  Pronuba/1.1