Menian COLUMN, any column which supports a balcony or meniana. The origin of this kind of column, Suetonius and Ascanius refer to one Menias; who having sold his house to Cato and Flaccus, consuls, to be converted into a public edifice, reserved to himself the right of railing a column withoutside, to bear a balcony, whence he might see the shows.