HALSTEAD, a market-town in the county of Essex, on an acclivity rising from the river Colne, 46 miles E.N.E. of London. The town, though irregularly built, has a neat appearance, and the streets are generally wide and clean. The parish church, a fine Gothic building in the perpendicular style, has been recently almost wholly rebuilt. The Church of the Holy Trinity is also a handsome building, in the early English style, erected in 1844. Halstead possesses a grammar and other schools, mechanics' institute, savings bank, market-house, and several charities. Market-day, Friday. Manufactures of silk and velvet and straw-plaiting are chiefly carried on. Pop. (1851) 5658.
HALTERES (ἀλτήρες), in the gymnastic exercises of the Greeks and Romans, were certain masses of lead, iron, or stone, held in the hands in leaping, to give impetus to the body; or swung to and fro in much the same manner as our dumbbells. Galen (De Tuend. Valetud., lib. i., v., and vi.) recommends this kind of exercise for purifying the humours of the body.