Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Scytala

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. 

SCYT'ALA or SCYT'ALE (σκυτάλη). A Greek term for a stick; thence a roller or staff employed at Sparta for the purpose of enabling the government to communicate secret despatches to their generals, which was effected in the following manner. A strip of leather was first rolled slantwise upon a wooden cylinder, and upon this the orders written lengthwise; so that when the leather was unrolled from the cylinder, it contained only a series of single letters without any consecutive meaning. In this state the strip was transmitted to their officer, who ascertained the contents by applying it to another cylinder of precisely the same dimensions, given to him before he set out for the campaign. Nep. Paus. 3. Aul. Gell. xvii. 9. 3.