Bajulus
ἀχθοφόρος
Bajulus (ἀχθοφόρος), a porter, anyone employed to carry burdens, whether a freeman or a slave. (Gel. 5.3.1; Fest. p. 35; Plaut. Poen. 5.6, 17; Cic. de Or. 2.1. 0, 40, Par. 3.2; cf. Dig. 50, 16, 235.) The name was also given to a letter-carrier. (Symmach. Ep. 3.34, 5.7; Sidon. Ep. 4.7; Hieron. Ep. 6 ad Julian. 1; Cod. Theod. 2, 27, 1.2.) The bearers at funerals, properly called vespillones, sometimes had the name of bajuli. ( Vespillones dicti sunt bajuli,
Fulg. Expos. Serm. p. 558; Amm. 14.7 § 17; Sidon. Ep. 3.12.)
From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.