Also cestos. [L. cestus, ad. Gr. κεστός; properly vbl. adj., ‘stitched.’]
A belt or girdle for the waist; particularly that worn by a bride in ancient times.
1577. trans. Bullinger’s Decades (1592), 236. For Cestus signifieth the Marriage girdle which the Bride did weare.
1736. Bailey (Folio), Cestus, a Marriage-girdle, that of old Times the Bride used to wear, and the Bridegroom unloosed on the Wedding-night.
1778. Sir N. Wraxall, North. Courts (Warsaw) The princess wore round her waist a girdle or cestus of silk, nine inches broad: it is the zone of the Greeks and is still worn in Wallachia.
1870. L’Estrange, Miss Mitford, I. ii. 40. To complete the set of amethysts by a bandeau and tiara, a cestus for the waist.
b. spec. That of Aphrodite or Venus.
a. 1661. Holyday, Juvenal, 130/1. Like the outragious love of Jupiter to Juno, effected by the cæstus, or girdle of Venus, as it is in Homer. Iliad. 18.
1709. Steele & Addison, Tatler, No. 147, ¶ 3. This Cestus was a fine Party-coloured Girdle, which, as Homer tells us, had all the Attractions of the Sex wrought into it.
1712. Addison, Spect., No. 425, ¶ 4. Venus, without any ornament but her own beauties, not so much as her own cestus.
1850. Leitch, trans. C. O. Müller’s Anc. Art, § 376. 474. She also appears half-draped, girding herself with the cestus, on coins of Domitian.
c. fig.
1651. Jer. Taylor, Holy Dying, iii. 105 (L.). As soon as that Cestus [of lust and wanton appetite] that lascivious girdle is thrown away, then the reins chasten us.
1865. Carlyle, Fredk. Gt., IX. XXI. iii. 295. The brightest jewel in the cestus of Polish Liberty is this right of confederating.
