Pl. caducei. [L. cādūcĕus (also cādūcĕum), ad. Dor. Gr. κᾱρύκειον, καρύκιον (Att. κηρύκειον), a herald’s wand, f. κῆρυξ herald.]
The wand carried by an ancient Greek or Roman herald. spec. The fabled wand carried by Hermes or Mercury as the messenger of the gods; usually represented with two serpents twined round it. (This is the earliest and proper sense in English.)
1591. Spenser, M. Hubberd, 1292. He tooke Caduceus his snakie wand, With which the damned ghosts he gouerneth.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., II. iii. 14. Mercury, loose all the Serpentine craft of thy Caduceus.
1668. Lond. Gaz., No. 243/2. The Heralds in their Coats of Armes, and Caducei in their hands.
1753. Chambers, Cycl. Supp., Caduceus, is also a name given to a kind of staff covered with velvet, and decorated with flower de luces, which the French heralds of arms bear in their hands on solemn occasions.
1873. Symonds, Grk. Poets, xii. 410. He [Hermes] leads souls to Hades, caduceus in hand.
fig. 1860. R. Vaughan, Mystics, II. IX. iii. 137. The long process of vigil … which, with the caduceus of asceticism … lulls to slumber the Argus-eyed monster of the flesh.
