denotes a thing defended or covered on all sides with armour.

or Cataphractorius, more particularly denotes a horseman, or even horse, armed with a cataphracta. The cataphracti equites were a sort of cuirassiers, not only fortified with armour themselves, but having their horses guarded with solid plates of brass or other metals, usually lined with skins, and wrought into plumes or other forms. Their use was to bear down all before them, to break in upon the enemy's ranks, and spread terror and havoc wherever they came, as being themselves invulnerable and secure from danger. But their disadvantage was their unwieldiness, by which, if once unhorsed, or on the ground, they were unable to rise, and thus fell a prey to the enemy.