a piece of defensive armour used by the ancients. It was worn on the left arm, and composed of wickers woven together, or wood of the lightest sort, covered with hides, and fortified with plates of brass or other metal. The figure was sometimes round, sometimes oval, and sometimes almost square. Many of these bucklers were curiously adorned with figures of birds and beasts, as eagles and lions, and of the gods, the celestial bodies, and all the works of nature; a custom which was derived from the heroic times, and from them communicated to the Grecians, Romans, and Barbarians. The scutum, or Roman buckler, was composed of wood, the parts being joined together with little plates of iron, and the whole covered with a bull's hide. In the middle was an iron boss or umbo jutting out, to glance off stones and darts, and sometimes to press violently upon the enemy, and drive all before them. The scuta are to be distinguished from the clipeus, which were less in size, and quite circular. This species of shield belonged properly to other nations, though for some little time it was used by the Romans. The scuta themselves were of two kinds, the orata and the imbricata; the former being a plain oval figure, the latter oblong, and bending inward like half a cylinder. Polybius makes the scuta four feet long, while Plutarch calls them ἐκβολίς, reaching down to the feet; and it is very probable that they covered almost the whole body, since in Livy we meet with soldiers, who stood on the guard, sometimes sleeping with their head on their shield, having fixed the other part of it in the earth.

Votive Bucklers, those consecrated to the gods, and hung up in their temples, either in commemoration of some hero, or as a thanksgiving for a victory obtained over an enemy, whose bucklers, taken in war, were offered as trophies.