Encyclopaedia Britannica; or, A dictionary of arts and sciences, compiled upon a new plan … > Volume 2, C-L

CUR (
und^r fevere penalties, that, at the ringing of a bell
at eight o’clock in the evening, every one Ihould put
out their lights and fires, and go to bed: whence, to
this day, a bell rung about that time is called a cur¬
few-bell.
CURIA, in Roman antiquity, a certain divifion, or por¬
tion of a tribe. Romulus divided the people into thir¬
ty curias, or wards, whereof there, were ten in every
tribe, that each might keep the ceremonies of their
feafts and facrifices in the temple, or holy place, ap¬
pointed for every curia. The priefl: of the curia was
called curio.
Curia, in the Engl ilh law,'generally fignifies a court;
and has been taken for the cuftomary tenants, who do
their fuit and fervice at the court of the lord. See
Court.
CURIISTG, a term ufed for the preferring filh, flefh, and
other animal fubfiances, by means of certain additions
of things, to prevent putrefaftion. One great method
of doing this, is by fmoking the bodies with the fmoke
of wood, or rubbing them with fajt, nitre,
CURLEW, in ornithology. See Scolopax.
CURNOCK, a rneafure of corn, containing four bulhels,
or half a quarter.
CURRANS, or Currants, the fruit of a fpecies of
grofiularia. See Grossularia.
The white and red fort are moftly ufed; for the
black, and chiefly the leaves, uponfirft coming out, are
in ufe to flavour Englifli fpirits, and counterfeit French
brandy. Currants greatly afiuage drought, cool and
fortify the ftomach, and help digeftion.
Currants alfo fignify a fmaller kind of grapes brought
principally from Zant.and Cephalonia. They are ga¬
thered off the buihes, and laid to dry in the fun,
and fo put up in large butts. They are opening and
pedoral, but are more ufed in the kitchen, than in
medicine.
Currants, the hundred weight pay on exportation
i 1. 23. i-j^d. and drawback on exportation 11. os.
7 i^od. ^ imported in Venetian (hips, they pay the
112 lb. i 1. 3 s. 7t3cM. and draw back 11. is. SV^d.
In otheyr foreign bottoms they pay 11. ys. 4t9/o
and draw back i 1. 5 s. 6-n£s'd.
CURRENT, in hydrography, a ft re am or flux of wa¬
ter in any dire&ion. In the fea, they are either na¬
tural, occafioned by the diurnal motion of the earth
round its axis, or accidental, caufed by the waters be¬
ing driven againft promontories, or into gulfs and
{freights,. where, wanting room to fpread, they are
driven back, and thus difturb the ordinary flux of the
fea. Dr Halley makes it highly probable that in the
Downs, ‘there are under-currents, by which as much
water is carried out as is brought in. by the upper-cur¬
rents.
Currents, in navigation, are certain fettings of the
ftream, by which {hips are compelled to alter their
eourfe or velocity, or both, and fubrnit to the motion
ivnpreffed upon them by the current. See Naviga¬
tion.
CURRIERS, ihofe who drefs and colour leather after
it comes from the tan yard. See Tanning.
00 ) C U S
CURRUCU, in ornithology. See Motacilla.
CURRYING, the method of preparing leather with oil,
tallow, See Tanning.
CURTATE dijianee, in aftronomy, the diftance of a
a planet from the fun to that point where a perpendi¬
cular let fall from the planet meets with the ecliptic.
CURTATION, in aftronomy, is the interval between
a planet’s diftance from the fun, and the curtate di-
ftance.
CURTIN, Curtain, or Courtin, in fortification,
is that part of the rampart of a place which is be¬
twixt the flanks of two baftions, bordered with a pa¬
rapet five feet high, behind which the foldiers' Hand
to fire upon the covered way and into the moat.
CURVATOR coccygis, in anatomy. See Vol. I. p.
220.
CURVATURE of a ' line, is the peculiar manner of
its bending or flexure by which it becomes a curve of
fuch and fuch peculiar properties.
CURVE, in geometry, a line which running on conti¬
nually in all diredlions, may be cut by one right line
in,more points thanone. See Conic Sections, and
Fluctions.
CURVET, or Corvet, in the menage* an air in which
the horfe’s kgs are raifed higher than in the demi volt;
being a kind of leap up, and a little forwards, where¬
in the horfe raifes both his fore-legs at once, equally
advanced, (when he is going ftraight forward, and not
in a circle), and as his fore-legs are falling, he imme¬
diately raifes his hind-legs, equally advanced, and not
one before the other : fo that all his four legs are in
the air at once;, and as he fets them down, he marks
but twice with them.
CURVILINEAR, or Curvilineal, is faid of figures
boundedEy curves, or crooked lines.
CURVIROSTRA, in ornithology. See Loxia.
CURULE chair, in Roman antiquity, a chair adorned
with ivory, wherein the great magiftrates of Rome
had a right to fit and be carried.
The curule magiftrates were the asdlles, the praetors,
cenfors, and confuls. This chair was fitted in a kind
of chariot, whence it had its name. The fenators
who had borne the offices of aediles, praetors, <bc.
. were carried to the fenate-houfe in this chair, as were
alfo thofe who triumphed, and fuch as went to admi-
nifter juftice, e5rc. See A£dile, fac.
CURZOLA, an ifland in the gulf of Venice, upon the
coaft of Dalmatia, about twelve miles from the ifland
of Lefiina.
CUSCO, the capital city of Peru, during the reigns of
the Incas: it isftill a fine city, aid the fiee of a bi-
fhop, and Hands about 350 miles eaft of Lima, in 70*
W. long, and 130 S. lat.
CUSCUTA, or D Odder, a genus of the tetrandria digy-
nia clafs. The calix confifts of four fegments; the co¬
rolla has but one petal ; and the capfule is bilocular.
The are twm fpecies, one of which is a native of
Britain, viz. the Europcea, dodder, hell-weed, or
devil’sguts.
CUSPIDATED, in botany, are fuch plants whofe
leaves are pointed like a fpear.
CUSTOM,