The ancient Greek word referred to the cup-shaped seed vessel of the Egyptian water-lily nelumbium speciosum and came to describe a drinking cup made from that seed casing, or in a similar shape. These vessels were particularly common in Egypt and the Greek East. The word "'ciborium'" was also used in classical Latin to describe such cups, although the only example to have survived is in one of Horace’s odes (2.7.21–22).