The insignia of office were the lituus, a staff free from knots and bent at the top, and the trabea, a kind of toga with bright scarlet stripes and a purple border.
The lituus consisted of a cylindrical tube 4 or 5 ft.
Unlike the buccina, cornu and tuba, the other military service instruments of the Romans, the lituus has not been traced during the middle ages, the medieval instrument most nearly resembling it being the cromorne or tournebout, which, however, had lateral holes and was played by means of a reed mouthpiece.
A lituus found in a Roman warrior's tomb at Cervetri (Etruria) in 1827 is preserved in the Vatican.
On the left returning wall is a train of priestly attendants headed by the chief priest and priestess (the latter carrying a lituus), clad in the dress of the deities they serve and facing an altar, behind which is an image of a bull on a pedestal (representing the god); then comes an attendant leading a goat and three rams for sacrifice, followed by more priests with litui or musical instruments, after whom comes a bull bearing on his back the sacred cista (?).