Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Pulvinus

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. 

PULVI'NUS. In its general applications has nearly the same meaning as Pulvinar, a pillow, cushion, or bolster; but, in strictness, of a smaller and less ostentatious character, and so more particularly descriptive of those which were used for sitting on (Cic. Or. i. 7. Id. Fam. ix. 18., and woodcut s. CATHEDRA), resting the head against, like the pillow of a bed (Sall. Jug. 74, and woodcut s. CERVICAL), or leaning upon, like the pillow on which a person supported his elbow on a triclinary couch (Nepos, Pel. 3. and woodcut s. CUBITAL), than of such as were intended for the reception of the body in a reclining posture.

2. In architecture, the bolster or baluster on the sides of an Ionic capital (Vitruv. iii. 5. 7.), which imitates the full and swelling outline of a stuffed cushion as shown by the preceding woodcut.

3. In a warm-water bath (alveus), the part immediately above the step (gradus) on which the bather sat, and which thus constituted as it were a cushion for his back to lean against (Vitruv. v. 10. 4.). The illustration (Pulvinus/3.1) represents a section of the warm bath in the thermal chamber at Pompeii, in which A is the bath itself, B the step on which the bather sat, and C the cushion or pulvinus for his back.

4. A ridge between two trenches in a field or garden (Plin. H. N. xvii. 35. § 4.); and a raised border or flower bed (Varro, R. R. i. 35. 1.); both from their resemblance to the upheaving form of a pillow or squab.

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  Pulvinus/3.1