I ■■ •*•■■■■■■■ ■■ •■■■ ■■ il ill •■ il il II II •■•*•■•■ it it ft el il IB lit! it ilttll il ■■■! FINE A i £8*5 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY FINE ARTS LIBRARY Cornell University Library NA2815.H69 A treatise on the five orders of archite 3 1924 014 942 175 ,„, | DOES NOT CIRCULATE DATE DUE V&& 00 f*^ m ;l ) 1 u Vt 1 A AH (IB !tg !** ■^T ft M *» jjWW™'^ ^ffWT PRINTED INUS.A FRAGMENTS OF OLD WORK A TREATISE ON THE FIVE ORDERS OF ARCHITECTURE Compiled from the works of Sir William Chambers, Palladio, Vignola, Gwilt and others With Illustrations, Notes, and Essays on various phases of Classical ARCHITECTURE Compiled, Revised and Edited BY FRED T. HODGSON, F. R. I. C. A. Author of the "Steel Square and its Uses," "Practical Carpentry," "Estimators' Guide," "The Care and Management ol Hand-Saws," etc., etc. Illustrated with Thirty-nine full page Plate* CHARLES S. PRATT New and Old Books, Stationery, Blank Books 161 SIXTH AVE. (Neari2ihS(.) NEW YORK CATALOGUES FREE Copyright 1910 BY Fbidbbiok J. Dbaks & Co. PRELIMINARY. TO THE READER. Dear Friend: — "The Five Orders of Architecture," aB presented in this work, are mostly compiled from the works of Sir William Chambers, whose writings on the subject have been considered among the very best. They are scholarly, correct, and followed by our best architects as standards of good taste, and true to the originals. Nearly all the illustrations, with measurements included, are re- produced from the original drawings made by Sir William, and are valuable on that account as well as because of their being made in conformity to the most approved usage. While I have kept pretty close to Sir William's text, I have in a number of instances included the expressed opin- ions of several other noted architects and authorities which I have not named in the general text, as I did not think this necessary in a work that is understood by the reader to be almost altogether a compilation. It has simply been my duty to rearrange the work, eliminate a large portion of the old text, to rewrite and modernize some portions, and endeavor to adapt it to the requirements of present usage and the understandings of American Workmen gen- erally. If I have succeeded only in part, I will feel that I have done some little towards helping my fellow co-labor- erB in the Building trades — and this will be an appreciated reward. Respectfully yours, Feed T. Hodgson. Collingwood, Ont., May, 1910. xiii Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014942175 FOKEWOKD. This book is intended to be one of INSTBUCTION; and it contains sufficient information, rules and directions to enable any studious or ambitious young workman to obtain a fair, workable knowledge of the design and con- struction of the Greek and Eoman Orders of Architecture. The thirty-nine full-page plates, show beautiful examples of classic work, many of them being figured, giving dimen- sions and correct proportions of the work, so that the student may easily work out a series of designs to suit the work in hand, if it so happens to demand classic treat- ment. The designs for doors, windows, and details given should prove guides for the proper formation of such work in harmony with the style and character of the main structure : a most important matter in the designing of an edifice of any pretension. The compiler of this work has endeavored to adhere closely to the rules and proportions as laid down by that eminent architect, Sir William Chambers, who based all his efforts on the rules and usages as practiced by the old masters, and which, up to this date, have never been superseded. There have been many attempts made by modern architects, to modify and change the proportions, and the assembling of the various orders; and while there has been a partial success in some instances, the greater number of these departures have been more or less failures, some of them miserable failures, and it would have been much better all round, if no departure had been attempted. xv xvi Foreword The introduction of structural steei work and the free use of Portland cement, have changed somewhat the char- acter of buildings and mode of construction to such an ex- tent, that in many instances a departure from the old cannon of proportion and methods of construction, be- came not only permissible, but were absolutely necessary to meet the demands and requirements of the new order of things. Under these conditions, however, the architect rarely attempts to produce purely classic work. This book, if closely followed, will render it easy for the carpenter, the draftsman, the stone-cutter, or the general builder, to design columns or other details of the orders, in proper style and proportion in such a manner that even an expert would be obliged to admit the work as almost faultlesB. The plates are fine reproductions from the originals, and are in themselves, lessons for instruction in art and edu- cation. THE FIVE ORDERS OF ARCHITECTURE INTRODUCTORY. This treatise is prepared for the building operatives of America, merely to give them a working knowledge of the Grecian and Eoman Orders, their various styles and pro- portions, and the character of details that should accom- pany each order; and in doing this I have followed Sir William Chamber's works as being in my estimation, the best and clearest expositions recorded, and the most suit- able for the purpose I have in view. While I shall follow Chambers closely, and quote him lengthily, I will not forget other great architects who have written on the subject, especially old Vitruvius, Palladio, Vignalo, Scamozzo, Inigo Jones, Wren, Leeds and other authorities, including Peter Nicholson, Gwilt and our own Sturgis. Indeed, the whole volume here presented, will be more of a compilation from the best sources attainable, than of originality on my part, but, as I have already stated, this work is prepared, first, to meet the wants of the operative builder, whether he be a mason, a bricklayer, a carpenter or a plasterer, and, as it is always a difficult undertaking to deal with matters that form the contents of this book, or similar ones I recognize the fact that in an endeavor to make the subject plain to the vision of the workman, I shall be compelled to violate certain canons of conventional usage and accepted good taste, in order to "level up" with my readers. 17 18 The Five Orders of Architecture This work may not reach the altitude of the accom- plishments of many practicing architects, but I do flatter myself that no treatise on the "Five Orders of Archi- tecture," so concise, and so low priced, and so clear and understandable, was ever before laid before the American Workman. , The progress made, and being continually made, by the workmen in every trade and in every department of knowl- edges, renders it imperative that every man with a scintilla of ambition, should gather in, and foster every scrap of knowledge regarding his daily occupation, and it is with a view of helping those who are making efforts to help them- selves, this book is prepared, and I am sure it will com- mend itself to all workmen who are interested in build- ing because of its unassuming simplicity and clearness. To know something of the "Orders" is a duty which no builder should overlook, and the volume here presented, will supply all the knowledge required, if thoroughly stud- ied, to satisfy every requirement that any ordinary work- man will ever be called upon to make use of. The early Romans made a grave attempt to impress upon posterity, that the invention of the "Orders," or rather the perfecting of them, belonged to them. We now know bet- ter, and while the column and its enrichments may not have originated in Greece, it was Greek skill and Greek Art that gave us the models on which all our classic work is built. It is well to know this, and a very able architect puts the matter in verse: Thus he spoke of Rome: — "Go not there For Architecture's due. Rome's temples were But stol'n from Greece. Invention in the cause Of Heav'n she never exercis'd. She wrought With wondrous pow'r in all contrivances Which minister'd to man alone ; his pride, Introductory 19 His pleasure, comfort, — nay, his good, in much. She gave a plastic yielding to the fix'd And stubborn features of antique design. With light material she vaulted space, And emulated with capricious dome The heaven's concave. Range on range she pil'd Her column'd arcades, and, within th' ellipse Of her colossal theatre, gave room For populations. In her gorgeous baths Her swarth artificers, in thousands, lav'd Their limbs Herculean. In her palaces Th' imperial sway did vault itself in pomp Which startles record. Marble pillars, whose High tops o'erlook'd the panorama vast Of the world's capital ; and arches, rich In sculptur'd story, told of Conquest, far 'More dear to Rome than her own Liberty.' In the blue distance merging, aqueducts Stretched o'er the flat Maremma, to bear in From their fresh gushing springs the mountain waters ; And e'en the filth and offal of the city Found an imperial road to vent themselves Into the torrent of the startled Tiber! But this was architectural display; — Not the display of Architecture's self. Greatness — not grandeur — lifted here her head. Proud piles of masonry, hung with the spoils Of conquered Greece, uprose, to captivate The sense of sight — but not to strike the soul Of feeling." Of Greece he speaks more warmly: — "Greece claims our homage now, with milder show Of giant pow'r ; though not as if she lack'd it. Her gentler feeling for the beautiful All pride in grandeur qualifies. In vain She might essay to pass the fore-gone might Of Egypt ; but, in grace of majesty, — In all that marks the mind's accomplishment In high imagining and finish'd thought, — In elegance conjoining dignity, — In noble form and feature exquisite, Commanding deference and winning love, — In sage simplicity, — in modest truth, — In ardent worship of fair Nature's forms (Ev'n where invention o'ersteps Nature's law,) In decorative taste, — and, more than all, In Sculpture's last perfection, — where, O where May Greece a /ore-goer, or successor, find ! "Behold her Temples : the material works Of that pure intellect, which, through her Laws, 20 The Five Orders of Architecture Her Poetry, Philosophy, proclaim'd Itself alike. Had History been mute, Nor aught of Sage or Poet had remain'd, Th' Acropolis with all its eloquence Of Art, had still declar'd, here must have been The intellectual arch monarchy. As on Olympus met the Court of Jove, So on th' Athenian rock the symbols stand Of the Greek mind in its analysis ; Its strength, its majesty, its beauty, grace. Restore the Parthenon in all its pride! See high conception in its noble form : Each member in itself a studied piece Of a distinct perfection, subject to, And worthy of, the whole. Each ornament, As 'twere a fitting flow'r of rhetoric, By fancy us'd in aid of argument. Behold those Sculptures : models of the life, Which, as the world grows abler and more wise, Show more and yet more unattainable By rival skill or imitative care. Once more, survey the Temple round and round. No stone but is a monument of thought : No moulding nor enrichment, howso'er Remote, but shews an artist's reverence For that all-seeing Eye, which dwells, well pleas'd, On off'rings to its own exclusive eight." OF THE ORIGIN AND PROGRESS OF BUILDING. Buildings were certainly among the first wants of man- kind, and architecture must undoubtedly be classed among the earliest antediluvian arts. Scripture informs us that Cain built a city; and soon after the deluge we hear of many cities, and of an attempt to build a tower that should reach the sky — a miracle stopped the progress, and pre- vented the completion of that bold design. The first men, living in a warm climate, wanted no habi- tations; every grove afforded shade from the rays of the sun, and shelter from the dews of the night; rain fell but seldom, nor was it ever sufficiently cold to render closer dwellings than groves either desirable or necessary, even in the hour of repose; they fed upon the spontaneous pro- ductions of the soil, and lived without care as without labor. But when the human species increased, and the produce of the earth however luxuriant, was insufficient to supply the requisite food; when frequent disappointments drew on contention, with all its train of calamities, then sepa- ration became necessary, and colonies dispersed to different regions, where frequent rain, storms, and piercing cold, forced the inhabitants to seek for better shelter than trees. At first they most likely retired to caverns formed by nature in rocks, to hollow trunks of trees, or to holes dug by themselves in the earth; but, soon disgusted with the damp and darkness of these habitations, they began to eearch after more wholesome and comfortable dwellings. The animal creation pointed out both materials and manners of construction — swallows, wrens, bees, storks, 21 22 The Five Orders of Architecture were the first builders ; man observed their instinctive oper- ations; he admired, he imitated, and, being endued with reasoning faculties, and of a structure suited to mechanical purposes, he soon outdid his masters in the builder's art. Rude and unseemly, no doubt, were the first attempts; without experience or tools, the builder collected a few boughs of trees, spread them in a conic shape, and covering them with rushes, or leaves and clay, formed his hut, suf- ficient to shelter its hardy inhabitants at night, or in seasons of bad weather. But in the course of time men naturally grew more expert; they invented tools to shorten and improve labor; fell upon neater, more durable modes of construction ; and forms better adapted than the cone to the purposes for which their huts were intended. They felt the want of convenient habitations, wherein to taste the comforts of privacy, to rest securely, and to be effect- ually screened from troublesome excesses of weather. They wanted room to exercise the arts to which necessity had given birth; to deposit the grain that agriculture enabled them to raise in abundance ; to secure the flocks which fre- quent disappointments in the chase had forced them to collect and domesticate. Thus stimulated, their fancy and hands went arduously to work and the progress of im- provement was rapid. That the primitive hut was of a conic figure it is rea- sonable to conjecture, from its being the simplest of solid forms and most easily constructed. And wherever wood was found, they probably built in the manner above de- scribed, but soon as the inhabitants discovered the incon- venience of the inclined sides, and the want of upright space in the cone, they changed it for the cube; and, as it is supposed, proceeded in the following manner. Having, says Vitruvius, marked out the space to be oc- cupied by the hut, they fixed in the ground several upright The Five Orders of Architecture 23 fhi-J&jt*frt e? jli&jt Th*D.-ru Crdv.w. it/Impm*. Jfe* Crt/tn. tf TV Crnniluvt, CatizU. AjWMl— HOnf». ^ X. Fatti*.»*&frtKtr&i... A firmer* Sriji b,Ze*wjBps_.__ ...b C/c* t.IiBxt^Jjudt*^_^_lLAsir. ..... D. Serin. mWferJVOt rf^fflmittCL Triffypkr, -■- -7 JTUit. \.T<3&. o.Fil''ej-<.«-j£mubu. 1 .l$r*-J>w__ ..,_. p Curb erZchinu*. C Fillet er L-ir* tlnnrrQ JbMV H. G*f*. - lUWart CymMtr l>f# l.SWtef **&*** SJUto-... .„.. Z. fiteto erfliVtrrrunJ.. 2 ibrttdu ,__ i %». .. - W. CkUbm kiF PLATE 1 24 The Five. Orders of Architecture trunks of trees to form the sides, filling the intervals be- tween them with branches closely interwoven and spread over with clay. The sides thus completed, four beams were laid on the upright trunks, which being well fastened together at the angles of their junction, kept the sides firm, and likewise served to support the covering or roof of the building, composed of smaller trees placed horizon- tally like joists, upon which were laid several beds of reeds, leaves and earth or clay. By degrees other improvements took place, and means were found to make the fabric lasting, neat and handsome, as well as convenient. The bark and other protuberances were taken from the trees that formed the sides, these trees were raised above the dirt and humidity on stones, were covered at the top with other stones, and firmly bound round at both ends with osier or cords to secure them from splitting. The spaces between the joists of the roof were closed up with clay or wax, and the ends of them either smoothed or covered with boards. The different beds of materials that composed the covering were cut straight at the eaves, and distinguished from each other by different projections. The form of the roof too was altered; for being, on account of its flatness, unfit to throw off the rains which sometimes fell in great abundance, it was raised in the middle on trees disposed like rafters, after the form of a gable roof. This construction, simple as it appears, probably gave birth to most of the parts that now adorn our buildings, particularly to the orders, which may be considered as tta basis of the whole decorative part of architecture, for whe' structures of wood were set aside, and men began to ere< solid stately edifices of stone, having nothing nearer imitate, they naturally copied the parts which necessi introduced in the primitive hut; insomuch that the v The Five Orders of Architecture 25 right trees, with the stones and cordage at each end of them, were the origin of columns, bases and capitals; the beams and joists gave rise to architraves and friezes, with their triglyphs and metopes; and the gable roof was the origin of pediments, as the beds of materials forming the covering, and the rafters supporting them, were of cor- nices with their corona, their mutules, modillions, and dentils. That trees were the originals of columns seems evident, from some very ancient Egyptian ruins still existing; in which are seen columns composed of many small trees tied together with bandages to form one strong pillar, which, before stone was in use, became a necessary opera- tion in a country where no large timber was to be had, and in which the stupendous size of their structures con- stituted the principal merit. Herodotus describes a stately stone building which stood in 'the courts of the temple of Minerva at Sais, the columns of which were made to imi- tate palm trees. The form of the bundle pillar above men- tioned, though deriving its existence from necessity, is far from disagreeable. It was evidently a beauty in the eyes of the ancient Egyptians, since it was imitated by them in stone. And it seems more natural to suppose that fluted columns owe their origin to the intermediate hollows between the trees composing these pillars, than to the folds of a woman's garment, to which they have but very little resemblance. Vitruvius, the only remaining ancient writer upon the decorative part of architecture, ascribes almost every in- vention in that art to the Greeks — as if till the time of Dorus it had remained in its infant state, and nothing had till then appeared worth notice; and most, if not all the modern authors, have echoed the same doctrine. Yet, if ancient history be credited, the Egyptians, Assyrians, 26 The Five Orders of Architecture Babylonians, and other nations of remote antiquity, had exhibited wonders in the art of building even before the Grecians were a people. It must indeed be confessed, that though the works of the Asiatic nations were astonishing in point of size and extent, yet in other respects they were of a nature calcu- lated rather to give a high idea of the power and wealth of the founders, than of their skill or taste. We plainly see that all their notions of grandeur were confined to di- mension, and all their ideas of elegance or beauty to rich- ness of materials or gaudiness of coloring. We observe a barrenness of fancy in their compositions, a simplicity and sameness in their forms, peculiar to primitive inventions. But even in the early works of the Egyptians, beside their prodigious dimensions, there are evident marks of taste and fancy. It is in them we trace the first ornamental forms in architecture, and to their builders we are most probably indebted for the invention of columns, bases, capitals, and entablatures. We likewise read of roofs sup- ported by figures of colossal men and animals in the works of the Egyptians, several ages before the introduction of Persians or Caryatides in the structures of Greece, and of temples adorned with stately porticoes, enriched with col- umns and sculpture, and built before there were any tem- ples in Greece. Hence it may be inferred that the Grecians were not the inventors of ornamental architecture, but had that art, as well as their religion and gods, from the Egyptians — or from the Phoenicians, their nearer neighbors, whose skill in arts is said to have been anterior to theirs — though both were of Egyptian origin. Diodorus Siculus observes that the Egyptian priests proved, both by their sacred records and also by other un- doubted testimonies, that not only the poets and philoso- The Five Orders of Architecture 27 phers of Greece travelled anciently into Egypt to collect their knowledge, but also their architects and sculptors, and that everything in which the Grecians excelled, and for which they were famous, was originally carried from Egypt into Greece. The Phoenicians, however, were very early celebrated for their proficiency in the arts of design, and there is no doubt but the Greeks availed themselves of their inventions. We are told that Hiram made two capitals for the pillars Jachin and Boaz, in Solomon's temple; which, as far as can be collected from the accounts given of them in sev- eral parts of Scripture, very much resembled the Corin- thian capital both in form and proportions, though exe- cuted some centuries before Callimaehus is reported by Vitruvius to have invented it at Corinth. The cherubim of Hiram too, and the colossal figures of men and animals in the structures of the Egyptians, were prior inventions, and undoubtedly suggested to the Greeks their ideas of Persians and Caryatides. And though architecture is certainly indebted to the Grecians for considerable improvements, yet it may with confidence be averred that they never brought the art to its utmost degree of excellence. The art of building, says Leon Baptista Alberti, "sprang up and spent its adolescent state in Asia; after a certain time it flowered in Greece, and finally acquired perfect maturity in Italy among the Eomans." And whether we call to mind the descriptions given by ancient writers of Nineveh, Babylon, Thebes, Memphis, the Egyptian pyramids, the sepulchres of their kings, their temples, and other public monuments, or con- template, among the Eoman works, their palaces, amphi- theatres, baths, villas, bridges, mausoleums, and numerous other yet existing testimonies of their splendor; it must candidly he confessed that the Grecians have been far ex- 28 The Five Orders of Architecture celled by other nations, not only in the magnitude and grandeur of their structures, but likewise in point of fancy, ingenuity, variety and elegant selection. How distant the Grecians were from perfection in pro- portions in the art of profiling, and other parts of the de- tail, will soon be evident to any impartial examiner, who compares the publications of Le Eoi, Stuart, Revett, and other ingenious Levantine travellers with the antiquities of the Eomans, either on the spot, or as they have been given in books, by Palladio, Serlio, Desgodetz, Sandrart, Paranesi, and other authors. The last of those here men- tioned has published a parallel between the fairest monu- ments of Greece and Rome, which is recommended to the inspection and perusal of those who have not yet seen it. Indeed, none of the few things now existing in Greece, though so pompously described and neatly represented in various publications of our time, seem to deserve great no- tice, either for dimensions, grandeur of style, rich fancy, or elegant taste of design; nor do they seem calculated to throw new light upon the art, or to contribute towards its advancement, nor even those erected by Pericles or Alex- ander, while the Grecian arts flourished most; neither the famous lantern of Demosthenes, nor the more famous Par- thenon, which, though not so considerable as the church of St. Martin's Lane, exclusive of its elegant spire, had for its architects Phidias, Callicrates, and Ictinus ; was the boast of Athens, and excited the envy and murmurs of all Greece. We find indeed, in Pliny and other ancient writers very pompous descriptions of temples, such as that of Apollo at Miletus, of Ceres and Proserpine at Eleusis, of the Olympian Jupiter at Athens, and above all, of Diana at Ephesus, one of the seven wonders of the world. But if the Grecian architecture was defective in the time of Alexander, it must have been more so some centuries ear- The Five Orders of Architecture 29 lier, and concerning temples built in bogs, and founded upon wool to resist earthquakes, and of which the stones were set with sandbags, some doubts may be indulged, as well as of those made of wax, yet resisting the ardor of a Grecian sun; or those of brass, yet catching fire and melt- ing down. At first sight it may appear extraordinary that a people so renowned in arms, so celebrated for poetry, rhetoric and every sort of polite learning, and who carried sculpture further than any of the ancient nations, should be so de- ficient in architecture; yet, upon further consideration, many reasons will occur why it necessarily should be so: Greece, a country small in itself, was divided into a num- ber of little states, none of them very powerful, populous, or rich so that they could attempt no very considerable works in architecture, having neither the space, the hands nor the treasures that would have been necessary. "It must be owned," says Monsieur D'Ablancourt, "that Greece even in the zenith of her greatness, had more ambition than power ; we find Athens flattering herself with the conquest of the universe, yet unable to defend her own territories against the incursions of her neighbors; and who can re- frain from laughter at the Lacedemonians — rivals in fame with the Athenians, yet in despair, and reduced to sue for peace by the loss of four hundred men!" The lake of Mceris would have deluged all Peloponnesus, and ruined all Greece, Babylon would have covered Attica, and more men had been employed to build that city than there were inhabitants in all the Grecian states. The Egyptian laby- rinth was a hundred times larger than that of Crete, and more materials have been employed in one of the Egyptian pyramids than were used in all the public structures of Athens. If at the same time it be recollected that Greece, while 30 The Five Orders of Architecture divided into many governments, was constantly harassed with domestic wars, and, from its union, always in an un- settled situation; that an uncommon simplicity of man- ners prevailed among the Grecian states, and the strictest maxims of equality were zealously adhered to in most of them, it will be easy to account for the small progress made by the Greeks in architecture. Demosthenes ob- serves, that the houses of Aristides, Miltiades, or any of the other of the great men of the time, were no finer than those of their neighbors, such was their moderation, and so steadily did they adhere to the ancient manners of their country. One of the laws of Lycurgus ordained that the ceilings of houses should only be wrought by an axe, and their gates and doors be left rough from the saw — no other tools than these being permitted, which law was so scrupu- lously observed among the Lacedemonians that, when King Leotychides saw, at Corinth, a ceiling, of which the timbers were neatly wrought, it was so new a sight to him that he asked his host, if trees grew square in that country. It seems, indeed, as if these sumptuary laws of Lycurgus had made a general impression, and inspired the Greeks rather with contempt than veneration for splendid structures; even in their best time they accounted it an effeminate folly to be ostentatious in that respect. "All the states of Greece," says Plutarch, "clamoured loudly against Pericles for decorating Athens like a vain fantastic woman, and adorning it with statues and temples, which cost a thou- sand talents." What magnificence the Grecians displayed in their structures was confined to their public buildings, which were chiefly temples, wherein there appears to have been nothing very surprising either for dimensions, ingenuity of contrivance, or excellence of workmanship. Greece, al- most constantly the theatre of war, abounded not like Italy The Five Orders of Architecture 31 in magnificent villas, where the richest productions of art were displayed. Their public roads were not adorned with mausoleums to commemorate their heroes, nor the towns with arches or bridges to celebrate their triumphs. The Grecian theatres were inconsiderable, compared with those of the Eomans; the naumachise and amphitheatres un- known amongst them, as were also the thermae in which the Eomans affected so much splendor. In latter times, indeed, the Greeks, particularly the Athenians, abated of their original severity; the orator above mentioned observes that, in his time there were some private houses more magnificent than public edifices; but this does not appear to have been very common, and con- sequently could not be productive of much additional splen- dor; even Alcibiades, the most luxurious Greek of his time, for he was accused of wearing a purple cloak, and of sleeping upon a bed with a canvas bottom, doth not seem to have been better lodged than other Athenians, excepting that his house was painted. Since therefore, the Grecian structures are neither the most considerable, most varied, nor most perfect; it fol- lows that our knowledge ought not to be collected from them, but from some purer, more abundant source, which, in whatever relates to the ornamental part of the art, can be no other than the Eoman antiquity yet remaining in Italy, France, or elsewhere — vestiges of buildings erected in the politest ages by the wealthiest, most splendid, and powerful people of the world, who, after having removed to Eome, from Carthage, Sicily, Egypt, and Greece, the rarest productions of the art of design; as also the ablest artists of the times were constantly employed, during many cen- turies, in the construction of all kinds of edifices that either use, convenience, luxury or splendor required. Pliny in- forms us that the works of the Eomans were much more 32 The Five Orders of Architecture considerable than those of any other people; that in the course of thirty-five years more than a hundred sumptuous palaces had been erected in Eome, the most inconsiderable of which was fit for the residence of a king, and that in his own time, the time of Vespasian, there were a great num- ber much more splendid than any of the hundred above mentioned. The palaces of Caligula and Nero were in extent like towns, and enriched with everything that the most exquisite taste and the most unbounded liberality could suggest. The Eomans began early to cultivate architecture; sev- eral considerable works were erected by their kings, and many more during the magistracy of their consuls. Julius Cassar was passionately fond of that art; and, besides the building erected by him in Eome, "he embellished with considerable structures," says Suetonius, "the principal cities of Italy, France, Spain, Asia and Greece." Augustus boasted on his death-bed that he had converted Eome into a city of marble; he not only built much himself, but ex- cited his friends to follow the example; and Mecsenas, his favorite and minister, was the patron of arts, as well as of letters. Caligula and Nero were, to the utmost, splendid in their buildings. The latter carried his passion for architecture, as it is said, even to the extravagant excess of burning Eome, that he might have the pleasure of rebuilding it with greater regularity and magnificence, which he after- wards did. During the reigns of Claudius, Vespasian, Titus, Domi- tian, and Nerva many very considerable public works were erected both at Eome and in other parts of the Eoman dominions, and Vespasian not only re-edified the capitol with greater magnificence than before, but also all the other public buildings of Eome, which had suffered by the out- The Five Orders of Architecture 33 rages of the Vitellians. He obliged the proprietors of ruined houses to rebuild them, and caused to be erected several new edifices of great cost and magnificence, such as the Temple of Peace, the largest covered building of antiquity; another, dedicated to Minerva, of the richest and most exquisite workmanship ever exhibited in Eome, the first artists then alive having been employed to paint, carve, and incrustate the same. He also built the largest amphitheatre in the world, capable of containing eighty thousand spectators, and many other works of less note. His care and munificence extended themselves in like man- ner to all other parts of the Eoman empire, in which he erected new cities and towns, repaired, adorned and forti- fied such as were old or ruinous. Titus, his successor, was so attentive to the beauty of his metropolis that, when a dreadful fire had destroyed many of its temples and public buildings, he resolved to re-edify them at his own charge, with all possible expedition, dis- posing of the furniture and ornaments of his own palaces to defray the expense. Death prevented the completion of his intentions ; but Domitian finished what he had left un- done, and also adorned Eome with many new structures, particularly with a palace, surprising for the magnificence of its colonnades, the number of its rooms, the splendor of its baths and female apartments. His love for building was such that he wished to be another Midas, to the end that he might indulge his passion without control. Trojan, in whose reign the Eoman empire was in its most flourishing state, cultivated all the arts of design, and with the assistance of the celebrated Appolodorus, his principal architect, executed many very considerable works. He erected a bridge of stone over the Danube, sixty feet wide, one hundred and fifty feet high, and almost two miles in length. He also built several cities among the Dacians, 34 The Five Orders of Architecture embellished Eome and other parts of Italy with many public edifices, rebuilt Antioch, which had been almost totally destroyed by an earthquake, and also repaired many other towns in Syria that suffered at the same time by the same calamity. Adrian, whose skill in different branches of polite knowl- edge is well known, particularly, in the arts of design, em- bellished various parts of the Eoman city with splendid and beautiful structures, such as his bridge and mausoleum at Rome, his villa near Tivoli, his wall in Britain, which extended from the river Eden in Cumberland to the Tyne in Northumberland, many temples and other public build- ings in Gaul, in Greece, and in Africa, where he re-edified a considerable part of Carthage. He also rebuilt Jerusalem which Titus had demolished about sixty years before, and erected in Egypt, a stately pillar to the memory of Pompey. Antoninus Pius re-edified a great part of Eome, Nar- bonne, Antioch, and Carthage, all which cities had suffered considerably by fire. And it was his custom whenever any damage happened to a city by an earthquake, a fire, an inundation, or other calamitous accidents, to repair it with money taken out of the public treasury. He greatly improved the ports of Terracina and Gaeta, built consid- erable baths at Ostia, aqueducts at Antium, temples at Lavinium ; and all must be sensible how powerfully the example of princes operates upon the minds of their sub- jects, inspires the same passions, and excites to the same pursuits. In short, architecture continued to flourish among the Romans, though with abated lustre, till Constant ine re- moved the seat of empire to Byzantium, and the number of stately structures with which Rome and the Roman dominions abounded is almost increditable. Their very remains excite at this day the astonishment and admiration The Five Orders of Architecture 35 of every judicious beholder, in spite of all that length of time, wars, party rage, barbarism, casual events, super- stition, and avarice have done to destroy them. In these remains there will be found abundant mate- rials to work upon, and form a complete system of deco- rative architecture. The labors of the celebrated masters of the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries may, perhaps, be added to enrich the stock, and we may avail ourselves of their labors to facilitate or shorten our own; but it should always be remembered that, though the stream may swell in its course by the intervention of other sup- plies, yet it is purest at the fountain's head. And who- ever aims at being superiorly eminent in any profession must not receive his information at second hand from others, but mount himself to the origin and reason of things. "The man," says Michael Angelo, "who follows another always is behind, but he who boldly strikes into a different path may climb as high as his competitor, and though the road may be somewhat more rugged, yet, if his efforts are crowned with success, the reward will amply compensate for the risk and labor of the enterprise." An anonymous Italian writer observes, that the superi- ority of Eaphael, may perhaps be owing to his having been so universally admired and copied ; that the modern sculptors never equalled the ancient, because they have done nothing but imitate them ; and if, says he, all the ancient paintings hitherto discovered are inferior to the modern, it is perhaps owing to our painters not having had the works of an Apelles to copy. Nature is the supreme and true model of the imitative arts, upon which every 1 great artist must form his idea of the profession in which he means to excel ; and the antique is to the architect what nature is to the painter or sculptor 36 The Five Orders of Architecture the source from which his chief knowledge must be col- lected, the model upon which his taste must be formed. But as in nature few things are faultless, so neither must it be imagined that every ancient production in archi- tecture, even among the Romans, or Greeks, was perfect or a fit model for imitation, as blind adorers of antiquity are sometimes disposed to believe. On the contrary their remains are so extremely unequal that it requires the greatest circumspection and effort of judgment to make a proper choice. The Roman arts, like those of other nations, had their rise, their era of perfection, their decline. At Rome, as in London or Paris, there were few great archi- tects, but many very indifferent ones; and the Romans had their connoisseurs, as we have ours, who sometimes would dictate to the artist, and cramp the fortunate sallies of his genius, force upon him and the world their own whimsical productions, promote ignorant flatterers, dis- courage, even oppress, honest merit. Vitruvius, supposed to have lived in the Augustan age, complains loudly of this hardship, and there is a remark- able instance of the vindictive spirit of an ancient connoisseur, in Adrian, who put to death the celebrated Apollodorus, for having ventured a shrewd remark upon a temple designed by that Emperor, and built under his direction. In the constructive part of architecture the ancients do not seem to have been great proficients. I am inclined to believe that many of the deformities observable in the Grecian buildings must be ascribed to their deficiency in that particular, such as their gouty columns, their nar- row intercolumniations, their disproportionate architraves, their hypaethral temples, which they knew not how to cover, and their temples with a range of columns running The Five Orders of Architecture 37 in the centre to support the roof, contrary to every rule either of beauty or convenience. Neither were the Romans much more skilful; the pre- cepts of Vitruvius and Pliny on that subject are imperfect, Bometimes erroneous, and the strength or duration of their structures is more owing to the quantity and goodness of their materials than to any great art in putting them to- gether. It is not therefore from any of the ancient works that much information can be obtained in that branch of the art. To those usually called Gothic architects we are in- debted for the first considerable improvements in con- struction; there is a lightness in their works, an art and boldness of execution, to which the ancients never arrived, and which the moderns comprehend and imitate with dif- ficulty. England contains many magnificent examples of this species of architecture, equally admirable for the art with which they are built, the taste and ingenuity with which they are composed. One cannot refrain from wishing that the Gothic structures were more considered, better understood, and in higher estimation than they hitherto seem to have been. Would our dilettanti, instead of importing the gleanings of Greece — or our antiquaries, instead of pub- lishing loose incoherent prints, encourage persons duly qualified to undertake a correct elegant publication of our own cathedrals and other buildings called Gothic, be- fore they totally fall to ruin, it would be of real service to the arts of design, preserve the remembrance of an ex- traordinary style of building now sinking fast into oblivion, and at the same time publish to the world the riches of Britain in the splendor of her ancient structures. Michael Angelo, who, skilled as he was in mathematical knowledge, could have no very high opinion of the ancient 38 The Five Orders of Architecture construction, boasted that he would suspend the largest temple of antiquity, meaning the Pantheon, in the air, which he afterwards performed in the cupola of St. Peter's, at Rome. And Sir Christopher Wren has conducted all parts of St. Paul's, and many others of his numerous admirable works, with so much art that they are, and ever will be, studied and admired by all intelligent observers. To him, and to several ingenious artists and artificers since his time, we owe many great improvements in carpentery, which the English have established upon better principles, and carried to higher perfection than any other nation. Some of the French architects have likewise been very skilful in construction. The mason's art in particular has been considerably improved by that nation. And we are indebted to the French, to the Italian, and to a few of our own countrymen, for many valuable books in which the manner of conducting great works is taught, the nec- essary machines, tools, carriages, and other apparatus de- scribed, together with the properties, modes of preparing and of employing all kinds of materials used in building. They likewise have treated of the nature of soils, and the manner of laying foundations, of raising superstructures, and of every other particular having relation to the me- chanic arts connected with building. These books, the structures above mentioned, and many others to be found in England or elsewhere, are the schools from which the architect must collect the rudiments of con- struction, but practice, experience, and attentive observation are requisite to render him consummately skilled in this important part of his profession. The architect's aim being, as has been observed, to erect handsome, strong, convenient, salubrious, and comfortable edifices, to ascertain their value, and to build them with safety, ease, and frugality, the principals of his art may be The Five Orders of Architecture 39 ranged under four distinct heads, which are — distribution, construction, decoration, and economy. Of construction and decoration, it has been shown whence his knowledge should be collected; and of distribution, which comprehends all particulars relative to health, con- venience, comfort, pleasure and profit, the artist may col- lect his general idea from books or observations made upon buildings erected for various purposes, in different climates and ages; but it is only by practice that he can become expert in discovering the advantages or defects of situation, the nature of climates or expositions, the qualities of air. water, sail, and many other things necessary to be known, and it is only by a thorough acquaintance with the customs and modes of living of his own times, and with the dis- positions, amusements, occupations, and duties of his con- temporaries that he can effectually learn how to supply their wants or gratify their wishes. In countries where general custom governs most things, and where all persons of the same rank think, act and live nearly after the same manner, the distributive part of architecture has not so many difficulties; but wherever this is not the case, every new employer opens a fresh field for investigation, and the artist's task is never at an end. The economy of architecture is of so complicated, so ex- tensive a nature, that it is almost impossible for any man to know it perfectly, much more for an architect, whose mind must be loaded with a great variety of other knowl- edge. When, therefore, an artist has fixed his abode in any particular country or great city, it will be best to limit his researches at first to that place alone, informing himself of the different quarries, woods, kilns, seaports or other markets from whence it is supplied with materials for building, as also of the different natures and degrees of goodness of these materials, the proper times for providing 40 The Five Orders of Architecture them, the best means of transporting them to the places of their destination, their value, and upon what circumstances that value depends, to the end that he may be enabled at all times to account for the fluctuation of price, and to as- certain what they are justly worth. The principal difficulty of this inquiry arises, not only from the many causes upon which the value of things and their rise or fall depends but from the caution with which dealers and tradesmen of almost all denominations, con- ceal the secrets of their trade, and the real profits they have thereon. His next step must be to find out all the able artists and artificers of the place and its environs, to form an acquaint- ance with them, and examine carefully in what branches they particularly excel, how far their skill extends, what their dispositions, circumstances, and tempers are, with their characters and connections, that by combining these particulars he may employ their abilities upon every oc- casion to most advantage, as well for them as for himself. He must then make diligent inquiry into the usual prices allowed for every sort of labor or workmanship, according to its degree of perfection, how much time and what mate- rials are requisite to produce given quantities thereof., what profits, according to the usage of the place are allowed thereon to the master workmen, and in what manner it is measured or accounted for when done, that he may be entire master of his subject, and enabled to judge equitably between the employer and employed, as his station re- quires. These inquiries at the first be attended with con- siderable difficulty for the reasons before mentioned, but, like propositions in geometry, one information will facili- tate another, and in the course of a few years' practice the artist, if he be industrious and skilfully inquisitive, will have acquired a thorough acquaintance with whatever con- The Five Orders of Architecture 41 cerns his own circle, and then he may extend his inquiries to other parts. What is already known will serve as a clue to further knowledge, and, by degrees, he may become a very competent judge of every economical particular in all the provinces of an extensive kingdom. If in this chapter, or in other parts of the work, for it may be as well to apologize at once for all, the author has ventured to think for himself, and sometimes to start opin- ions differing from those of other men, he begs leave to say that it proceeds, not from the affectation of being either singular or dogmatical, but from conviction that his notions are always founded in reason or proved by well attested facts, and delivered with a wish to guide the reader right. All that has been said respecting the superiority of the Roman architecture was written a considerable time ago, when the Grecian had been extolled into repute, and structures were erecting in different parts of England after Attic designs. Fortunately, the sight of these first speci- mens excited no desire for more; after a few ineffectual struggles the Eoman manner obtained a complete victory. There seemed at that time, no further necessity to fight its cause, and these observations, intended for this work, were then suppressed. THE COLUMN. ITS ORIGIN AND HISTORY. The fundamental rudiments of architecture originated in the employment of the column. The term building, in the sense now used, denotes a structure made up of several essential and component parts, erected for a certain pur- pose. In these creations of man's genius we find the column a central figure, about which there seems to cluster the first efforts of scientific construction, and in all the various gradations through which the science of archi- tecture has passed, from the crude and gigantic piles of the ancients to the more finished and studied arts of modern times, the column has taken the lead of all other distinctive features, not only in deciding the style of the art employed, but in the method of the building. The use of a post, shaft or column for the purpose of sustaining some superin- cumbent weight was the outgrowth of man's necessity, and whether or not the suggestion came from nature, the fact remains that the first used was the trunks of trees, em- ployed in the same position in which they grew; and al- though it did not require much of a genius to employ the column for the purpose of sustaining weight, it called for a knowledge of mechanical construction to build safely upon such supports. In the course of this plan of the ancient builders, it became necessary to place upon the head of the column a block or beam, to more equally dis- tribute the weight. From this early suggestion we have the first idea of the capital. Beauty and the embellishment in architecture follow in the wake of necessity; and this is strikingly verified from 42 The Five Orders of Architecture 43 the fact that as soon as the column became one of the factors of construction the ancients began its decoration, and they seem to have made it the alphabet of all their constructive methods. We find that no sooner had it been employed by one of the ancient nations than it was taken up by another; and passing from period to period, it underwent a transitionary existence, until finally its character became so distinct and marked, that, instead of serving as one of the minor ad- juncts of a building, it became the principal and most im- portant feature, and in a measure regenerated and decided the style of the building in which it was used. The several ancient nations gave the column the characteristics of their educational development. The Egyptians are credited with the first efforts in the direction of a decided scientific pro- portion and form. From the plain cylindrical shaft, with a block or abacus at the top, they gradually developed the long curved capital, decorated with the lotus leaf and flower. The shaft also changed its proportion and appearance. Flutes were adopted, and it was otherwise decorated. From the use of wood for columns it was but another step to stone, and soon we find the roofs of their massive buildings and temples supported by monolithic structures of gi- gantic proportions, that would test the machinery of our own age to raise and set in place. Following the Egyptians, the Assyrians, builders of that wonderful city of ancient Babylon, began the use of the column, and still further improved on its contour and beauty. Burned clay moulded and sun dried, covered with cementing materials', was first employed by these people, who later used stone and marble, after the example of the Egyptians. To the Greeks, however, was left the problem of per- fecting and bringing to a distinctive ipsue what as yet 44 The Five Orders of Architecture seemed an addition, and not an essential, to their archi- tectural styles. The perfection of the Greek column began to assume shape B. C. 668; subsequently it branched into two distinct classes, which in time became known to history as the Doric and Ionic. The Doric was heavy and massive, with a plain abacus or capital; with none or very little, base. The Ionic, as of the most light and graceful char- acter, was treated with a delicate and refined feeling, its distinctive features being the scroll-like volutes that or- namented its capital and the moulded base. From the ideas thus generated by the several details of these two styles, as they came to be termed, sprang the perfection of classic art in the Corinthian column and capital from which that style of architecture takes its name. The Eomans invented and used a composition of the Ionic and Corinthian, with less of the solid effect of the former and more of the graceful finish of the latter, and designated the Composite; but it never ranked as an original creation, and therefore did not reach the dignity of a distinctive style. The Eomans also added another column or style taken from the Doric and Ionic, and designated it the Tuscan, after the country in which it originated. From the idea thus given to the world, and embraced in these several orders or styles of architecture, the architects of the tenth to the sixteenth centuries gradually developed and produced the Gothic column, using all the distinctive features of the five orders of classic architecture, which culminated in a light and highly ornamented column, capital and base. These being clustered, acted as a support, with all the stability of the Doric, without its heavy and cumbersome outline. And although the Gothic column seems to be more distinct and original in its form and detail, and to be more of an inventive creation than any of its predecessors, a study The Five Orders of Architecture 45 of its parts will determine the fact that it is but a copy from the ancients. Following the column from its birth to the present time, W3 seem to reach a point beyond which the inventive genius of man cannot go ; and it is a noticeable fact, that for three hundred years no improvement in these styles has been made, nor has any new style been invented. The ground had been so completely covered, and every form and out- line employed has been so thoroughly analyzed, that any new combination of forms resolve themselves into mere copies. We find, therefore, the architects of the present day using the same orders of architecture in the embellishment of their buildings, that were perfected in the erection of the gigantic works of antiquity, and those details that so marked the styles of Pagan temples now decorate the facades of our Christian buildings, without one single step towards improvement or originality. The fact that history re- peats itself in the events of nations is aptly demonstrated in the practice of ancient and modern architects. ON THE OEIGIN OF GRECIAN ARCHITECTURE. Though Babylonia, Chaldea, and Egypt, had attained very considerable proficiency in their architectural works at a very early period, as we must conclude from the ac- counts in the Holy Scriptures, no less than from those of ancient authors, yet neither of these countries can, from all that we collect, be said to have known or understood the principles of the art so as to have rendered it capable of affecting the mind otherwise than by the enormous mag- nitude of the works it produced. Nimrod built three cities in Chaldea. Nineveh was founded by Ashur, and we read of the establishment of towns in Palestine as early as the age of Jacob and Abraham. Later, in Homer's time, Egypt boasted her celebrated Thebes, which had at that period been long in existence. The age of the archi- tectural wonders and excavations of India is undecided. It seems likely that the Egyptians gained their architecture from the East, or as Jacob Bryant supposes, that the build- ings of both nations were erected by colonies of some great original nation. This supposition is borne out amaz- ingly by the singularities in common of the Indian and Egyptian styles. In the ornaments applied to each there is a striking similarity, and each delighted in structures of extraordinary dimensions. It was in Greece, however, that true architecture was reared; in that country she received all the elementary beauties of which she was susceptible, as well as those in her general forms with which the habits and character of the nation invested her. But it is not to be presumed that the Oriental and Egyptian architecture were devoid of beauty ; on the contrary, much 46 The Five Orders of Architecture 47 is to be admired in the detail of each. In that of the latter the forms of its masses are peculiarly grand. It has been noticed that the monotony of the ornaments which the Egyptians employed, renders them in some respect deficient in point of beauty, but let us always recollect it was from the foliage used by the Egyptians, particularly that of the lotus and palm tree, and even from their employ- ment of volutes, that the Grecians evolved the Corinthian capital. They had sufficient penetration to discover the sound principles on which the Egyptian architecture was founded, and judgment to select, improve and adopt what was worthy of imitation. It was, of course, by very slow steps that architecture proceeded to that perfection which it attained in Greece. The mechanical arts must have made considerable progress before buildings of stone could have been constructed. If we may believe Pliny, their early houses were but simple huts built of earth and clay, resembling the caverns from which they had but just emerged. The same author says, that the Greeks attributed the honor of inventing bricks to Euryalus and Hyperbias, brothers and natives of Attica. But the time in which these persons lived is unknown, and their introduction of the use of bricks into Greece is the utmost that can be assigned to them, if indeed the whole story be not a fable. The Athenians were amongst the earliest of the Nations of Greece, who became a body politic. Prom their indis- position to move far away from their country, they received as some conjecture, the appellation of "the Movers," though according to Plato, the import is more literal, from a be- lief that their ancestors actually sprang from the earth. The earliest of their kings, of whom we have notice was Ogyges, but of him little more than his name is known. His son Eleusinus, however, built the city of Eleusis, so 48 The Five Ordei; of Architecture that the father who also governed Bceotia must have in- troduced some civilization into those parts of Greece. The kingdom of Argos owed its foundation to Inachus, whose son Egialeus is said to have founded the kingdom of Sicyon. It has been conjectured, and with every appear- ance of probability, that the above two chiefs belonged to some of those different colonies which moved from Asia and Egypt, and first civilized the inhabitants of Greece, teaching them to dwell in cities, and to lead a less wander- ing life. These doubtless brought with them some remem- brance of the arts of their native countries. The step from the unwieldy Egyptian column to the Grecian Doric was indeed wide, yet experience shows us how very gradual is the advance of science, and through what a number of stages it must pass before it even approaches perfection. The earliest edifices of the Greeks were far from exhib- iting skill or elegance. The temple at Delphi, celebrated by Homer, and supposed by Bryant to have been originally founded by Egyptians, was according to Pausanias, little better than a hut covered with laurel branches. During the time of Vitruvius the ruins of the building wherein the Areopagus assembled were still visible; even this was, ac- cording to that architect but a miserable sort of structure. Cadmus, about 1519 B. C, has the reputation of having introduced to the Greeks the worship of the Egyptian and Phoenician deities, and of having instructed them to quarry and work the stone of the country so as to make it useful in building, and moreover of having taught them the art of fusing and working metals. From this period the Greeks rapidly advanced in civilization ; but the present state of the art at that early period cannot be satisfactorily de- termined, and the difficulties in the way of acquiring any certain knowledge on the subject render the task irksome, perhaps impossible to perform. The laws of Draco in the The Five Orders of Architecture 49 39th Olympiad are the most ancient writing, says Bryant, to which we can securely appeal. "When the Grecians be- gan afterwards to bestir themselves, and to look back upon what had passed, they collected whatever accounts could be obtained. They tried also to separate and arrange them to the best of their abilities ; and to make the various parts of their history correspond. They had still some good mate- rials to proceed upon, had they thoroughly understood them; but herein was a great failure. Among the various traditions handed down, they did not consider which really related to their country, and which had been introduced from other parts." If Pausanias could be relied on, the Greeks had at an extremely early period erected some very extraordinary buildings. This author, moreover, speaks of the Treasury of Minyas king of Orchomenus, and the Walls of Tiryns he designates as a work worthy the admiration of every age. The first mentioned building if constructed by Minyas must have existed previous to the taking of Troy, for Minyas reigned 1377 years before the Christian era, and the Walls of Tiryns, said to have been built by Proteus, which consist of immense irregular blocks of stone, must have been constructed about the same period. Goguet, to whom I am much indebted, observes that if these edifices are so ancient, it is very singular that Homer, Herodotus, Diodorus and Strabo should have never made any remark on, nor even mention of the Treasury of Minyas. Apollo- dorus and Strabo, however, speak of the Walls of Tiryns, saying that they were built by workmen whom Prcetus had brought from Lycia, and Homer records "the great walls." "The lasting Walls," of Tiryns still extant, in the small portion which remains, the work and arrangement are of a very remote age. It has been conjectured that the Treasury of Minyas bore a resemblance to the Treasury of Atreus at Mycenae, 50 The Five Orders of Architecture still in existence, in which the beds of the courses of stones are horizontally adjusted, and manifest an advanced stage of the art. What has been called the vaulting of this last mentioned Treasury is not entitled to that appellation. Though the internal face of the work is in the form of a circular spindle generated by the revolution of a segment of a circle about its chord, and not a paraboloid as a noble author has stated, yet its construction indicates no knowl- edge of the principles of arching or vaulting. The curve is obtained by each course corbelling over in horizontal beds and by afterwards working the inverted steps to the shape required. Nov/ in respect to that of Minyas, Pausa- nias says that it was vaulted and constructed of marble, although there is no likelihood, even so late as the age of Homer, that this material was employed in Grecian build- ings. "Had that been the case," says Goguet, "Homer would scarcely have omitted the mention of it in his description of the Palace of Alcinous, and much less in the Palace of Menelaus which was celebrated by him for the gold, silver, brass and ivory which it contained." If the introduction among the Greek of the instruments necessary for working materials be assigned to Daedalus, which it would be if we might rely on the authors of antiquity, it will be no easy task to reconcile the accounts of Pausanias and others with the truth, inasmuch as this person is allowed on all hands, to have existed, if at all, long subsequent to the periods above mentioned. Goguet has therefore made him altogether a fabulous personage, taking the name "Daedalus," to mean nothing more than a skillful workman, a meaning which he says has not escaped the notice of Pausanias. It is indeed surprising, had so wonderful an artist existed, that he should not have been celebrated by Homer, or that Herodotus, who availed himself of every opportunity for launching into anecdote, The Five Orders of Architecture 51 ehould, in describing the Labyrinth of Egypt, have said nothing in relation to that of Crete, especially as it would have been so much to the honor of his own country. Goguet is of opinion that many of the instruments whose introduction was attributed to Daedalus were not known to the Greeks even in the time of Homer, who does not spec- ify in his poems any other than the hatchet with two edges, the plane, the auger, and the rule. Neither square, com- passes, nor saw are particularised. The Greek significa- tion of a saw or its equivalent is not found in any of his works. The information gained from the Homeric writings, whose authenticity it is unnecessary to discuss in this place, and from the Odyssey more particularly, which, if not so ancient as the Iliad, must, nevertheless, have soon followed it, and is admitted on all hands to be of very high antiquity, shows us that in the age of the poet, the patri- archal was the form of government that prevailed, and that the chief buildings of those days were the palaces of the princes. At this period the Altar appears to have been the only structure for sacred use; it was little more than a hearth on which the victim was prepared for the meal. In earlier times the tops of mountains were selected not only by the Greeks but by other nations for the worship of their gods. Thus we find Hector sacrificing on the top of Ida. Not until after Homer's time was a regular priesthood established in Greece. At Sparta the office of priest was vested in the Kings. In Egypt, and in many other places, the dignity was obtained by inheritance. When the prin- cipal person was absent, it was customary for the next highest in rank present to offer the sacrifice. Thus was Eumseus engaged, as we find by the Odyssey. In this age we consequently find the altar in the King's palace — the part therefore in which it stood must occasionally have 52 The Five Orders of Architecture been used as a temple. Hence, it seems probable that until the sacerdotal was separated from the kingly office, the Grecian temple, properly so called, had no existence. Whilst on this subject perhaps a few words might serve to illustrate the condition of the art at the period of which we are speaking. For this purpose we will take the house of Alcinous, which is described as follows : "Within, seats were attached to the wall, in different places, from the entrance to the inner part of the house, and on them were covers of a light texture wrought by the women. These seats were occupied by the chiefs of the Phseacians, who sat eating and drinking. They were con- tinually feasting. Golden youths with blazing torches in their hands stood on the well-built altars, to light the house for the guests at night," etc., etc. Returning to the construction and arrangement of the hall, it has been surmised in a preceding page that it might, under all the circumstances, have furnished a hint for the rectangular and columnar disposition of the temple itself. We are unable to trace the degrees which intervened be- tween the sole use of the altar and the establishment of the Greek temple, or when the latter became a necessary ap- pendage to the religion of the country. "We are equally uninformed how the revolution happened which abolished the civil, judicial, and military offices of Kings, leaving the sacerdotal. But though the King's palace seems to have had no part appropriated to religious ceremony, yet being the depository of whatever furniture and utensils the rite of sacrifice required, a substitute would be wanted when this palace was no more. To supply this want the cell seems to have been added to the Greek temple." It is supposed by Eusebius and others that temples owe their origin to the reverence which the ancients had for their deceased friends and relations and benefactors, and that The Five Orders of Architecture 53 they were nothing more than stately monuments erected in honor of the early heroes who had conferred whilst liviiig some public benefit on mankind. The' temple of Pallas, for instance, at Larissa, was the sepulchre of Acrisius; Cecrops was interred in the Acropolis at Athens, and Ericthonius in the temple of Minerva Polias. A custom prevailed of even offering sacrifices, prayers, and libations at almost every tomb, — and in some cases the sepulchre of the dead was as much an asylum or sanctuary as after- wards the temple itself. That this honor was not confined to the gods, but extended to other great persons, may be seen by the evidence of Strabo. The houses of the Greeks at a very early period had an upper story over some part or parts of them. The passages in the Iliad, which tend to the proof of this, have by some persons, perhaps to strengthen a weak argument, been pro- nounced of doubtful antiquity. It will be needless, how- ever, to examine this assertion critically, because it is quite manifest that the Eastern dwellings were not confined within the limits of a single story. In Scripture we shall find several notices which prove this point satisfactorily. David, for instance, withdrew himself to weep for Absolom, in the chamber over the gate. Ahaz erected his altars upon the terrace of the upper chamber. We read of the summer chamber of Eglon which seems to have had stairs to it, through which Ehud escaped after he had revenged Israel. And these are all of them, by the Seventy, translated steps, the word used by Homer. Terraces on the tops of the Eastern houses were also general, for the Jewish law en- acted that persons should surround them with a protecting railing. In some of the Egyptian remains there are distinct traces of even more than two stories, and it is not, therefore, too much to contend for the existence of one in the time of the poet. 54 The Five Orders of Architecture The word stairs frequently occurs in the Odyssey in connection with similar words. Whether it signify a ladder or a staircase is of no importance, though the usual progress of invention would seem to indicate the priority of the ladder. Stone and brick were the materials most commonly em- ployed in the works of the Egyptians, from whom if Greece gained her knowledge in the arts, one can hardly see the necessity for the intermediate step of those wooden structures which are said to have been the original type of the Doric temple. It is, indeed, true that the forests of the country would have supplied timber in abundance, and the little labor requisite to work it would have been an additional inducement for its employment. The deducement of the parts of the Doric order entirely from wooden buildings is not without some anomalies which will be afterwards noticed in speaking of that order. The idea seems to have been current in the time of Vitru- vius, but upon his authority in matters of historical re- search not much reliance is to be placed. It cannot, how- ever, be denied that up to a comparatively late period timber was very extensively used in the construction of the Greek temple. In the time of Xenophon it was a material not considered too mean to be employed in forming the "statutes of Deities in the smaller temples, where neither a great revenue appropriated to religious purposes, nor extensive public favor, afforded means for large expense." If the wooden temples had altogether escaped the flames which consumed so many of them, it is not to be expected that they would, from the nature of the material, have escaped the all-devouring hand of time. As the principles of construction must bear some relation to the nature of the materials, the proportions of the wooden temple would in all probability have been different from those in which The Five Orders of Architecturt 55 stone was employed. The epistylium or beam laid on the top of the supports in the former, probably ran through each side of the building in one piece, but a block of stone, could it have been procured sufficiently long and deep for the purpose, would not have been raised to its place and deposited on the heads of the columns without such as- sistance from the complication of the mechanical powers, as would in those days, if even known, have proved so un- wieldy and expensive as to have rendered their application inexpedient. Here then is the first step towards a reduc- tion of the space between the columns which is denom- inated an intercolumniation : for it is to be remembered that at the period of which we are speaking, the arch was to all appearance unknown. Some general notion may be formed of the comparative antiquity of the different examples of the Grecian Doric by measuring their heights in terms of the lower part of the diameter of their shafts, of which more notice will be taken in a subsequent page — in this place, it is only necessary to state, that the massive proportions of the early Doric, such for instance as those used in the Temple at Selinuns in Sicily, where the columns are only five diameters in height, at a later period assumed a much greater appearance of delicacy and elegance, and that the intercolumniations of this order gradually increased as the art progressed towards perfection. The account of the Origin of the Orders of Architecture as given by Vitruvius seems too absurd a fable to need much discussion. It will not escape the notice of any one, that the time which he assigns for their origin, is long previous to the time of Homer, who does not in any part of his poems give the slightest hint which could lead us to a belief that there was what is understood by the word order to be found in any part of the buildings he describes, which 56 The Five Orders of Architecture had it existed, it seems at least probable, he would have mentioned. He speaks of temples consecrated to Neptune and Minerva, without describing them; it is likely, there- fore, that they were only altars to those deities. We will, however, give the account from Vitruvius, which is as follows : "Dorus, son of Hellen and the Nymph Orseis reigned over Achaia and Peloponnesus. He built a temple of this (the Doric) order on a spot sacred to Juno at Argos, an ancient city. Many temples similar to it were after- wards raised in the other parts of Achaia, though at that time its proportions were not precisely established. "When the Athenenians in a general assembly of the States of Greece, sent over into Asia, by the advice of the Delphic oracle, thirteen colonies at the same time, they appointed a Governor over each, reserving the chief com- mand for Ion, the son of Xuthus and Creusa, whom the Delphic Apollo had acknowledged as son. He led them over into Asia, where they occupied the borders of Caria, and built the great cities of Ephesus, Miletus, Myus (after- wards destroyed by inundation, and its sacred rites and suffrages transferred by the Ionians to the inhabitants of Miletus), Priene, Samos, Teos, Colophon, Chios, Erythrae, Phocsea, Clazomene, Lebedos and Melite. This last, as a punishment for the arrogance of its citizens, was detached from the other states in the course of a war levied on it, in a general council, and in its place, as a mark of favor towards King Attalus and Arsinoe, the city of Smyrna was received into the number of Ionian States. These re- ceived the appellation of Ionian, after the Carians and Lelegse had been driven out, from the name Ion, of the leader. In this country, allotting different sites to sacred purposes, they erected temples the first of which was dedi- cated to Apollo Panionius. It resembled that which they The Five Orders of Architecture 57 had seen in Achaia, and from the species having been first used in the cities of Doria, they gave it the name of Doric. As they wished to erect this temple with columns, and were not acquainted with their proportions, nor the mode in which they should be adjusted, so as to be both adapted to the reception of the superincumbent weight, and to have a beautiful effect, they measured a man's height by the length of the foot, which they found a sixth part thereof, and thence deduced the proportion of their columns. Thus the Doric order borrowed its proportion, strength and beauty from the human figure. On similar principles they afterwards built the Temple of Diana; but in this, from a desire of varying the proportions, they used the female figure as a standard, making the height of the column eight times its thickness, for the purpose of giving it a more lofty effect. Under this new order they placed a base as a shoe to the foot. They also added volutes to the capital, resembling the graceful curls of the hair, hanging therefrom to the right and left certain moldings and foliage. On the shaft channels were sunk, bearing a re- semblance to the folds of a matronal garment. Thus were two orders invented, one of a masculine character, without ornament, the other of a character approaching the deli- cacy, decorations and proportion of a female. The suc- cessors of these people, improving in taste, and preferring a more slender proportion, assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric column, and eight and a half to the Ionic. That species of which the Ionians were the invent- ors has received the appellation of Ionic. The third species, which is called Corinthian, resembles in its char- acter the graceful, elegant appearance of a virgin, whose limbs are of a more delicate form, and whose ornaments should be unobtrusive. The invention of the Capital of this order arose from the following circumstance: A 58 The Five Orders of Architecture GRECIAN ARCHITECTURE. PLATE n The Five Orders of Architecture 59 Corinthian virgin, who was of marriageable age, fell a victim to a violent disorder ; after her interment, her nurse collecting in a basket those articles to which she had shown a partiality when alive, carried them to her tomb, and placed a tile on the basket, for the longer preservation of its contents. The basket was accidentally placed on the root of an acanthus plant, which, pressed by the weight, shot forth, towards spring, its stems and large foliage, and in the course of its growth reached the angles of the tile, and thus formed volutes at the extremities. Callimachus, who for his great ingenuity and taste in sculpture, was called by the Athenians "the Master," happening at this time to pass by the tomb, observed the basket and the delicacy of the foliage which surrounded it. Pleased with the form and novelty of the combination, he took the hint for inventing these columns, using them in the coun- try about Corinth," etc. Whoever reads the above account can give it but little credit. The testimony of Vitruvius on matters which oc- curred so long before his time, unless authenticated by earlier writers, cannot be received in an investigation sim- ilar to that in which we have followed. History furnishes us with few means of ascertaining the progress and condition of the fine arts among the Greeks, between the period commonly assigned to the siege of Troy, and that of the time of Solon and Pisistratus 590 years B. C. In Greece Proper, it is probable that the ad- vancement was slow, whilst its colonies established on the coast of Asia Minor were making rapid strides towards perfection. Goguet speaks of Asia Minor as the cradle in which architecture was rocked, and the soil on which it grew and flourished, and thinks that we must look to that country for the origin of the Doric and Ionic orders. This will be presently examined. The Corinthian order, from 60 The Five Orders of Architecture what we can learn, did not appear till some time after- wards, and is generally allowed to have been the invention of the mother country itself. One of the earliest temples of the Greeks, that of Jupiter at Olympia, must, according to Pausanias, have been built about 630 years before the Christian era. That of Diana at Ephesus was begun at a period little less remote, if Livy be right in his assertion that it was reared at the time that Servius Tullius was King of Rome; and that date, be it observed, accords with the statements of other ancient writers. Notwithstanding the magnitude of these works, the science of mechanics was in its infancy. Even in the time of Thucydides, the powers of the crane though known, were not compendi- ously applied for raising weights. Before proceeding more particularly to the view which it is proposed to take of the Greek architectural orders, it may be convenient to state here, that the Greeks bestowed but little attention on their private houses. All the splendor and magnificence of the art was reserved for the embellishment of their temples and other public buildings. If the birthplace of the Doric order gave it a name, to which of the provinces which went under the name of Doria is it to be referred, for they were many? To what author shall we turn to enlighten us on this subject, be- sides Vitruvius, on the very face of whose account we find such a mass of absurdity? It would be ridiculous to sup- pose that the order was perfected by one person, or in one period, and at this time all the researches that can be made are unfortunately not likely to give us a satisfactory ac- count of the name which it bears. Names are often the last means that should be resorted to for ascertaining the import or origin of the things which bear them. The detail of the Doric order is said by a host of writers, with Vitruvius at their head, to have been borrowed from The Five Orders of Architecture 61 the assemblage of timber framing in a common hut, and that it was the result of copying in stone the form and parts of a wooden building. This, it must be confessed, seems contrary to the ordinary progress of the arts and sciences. Stone buildings would scarcely be the immediate followers to those constructed in timber, where bricks were known; however, if that were the case, the latter must have been carried to great perfection in their forms, ar- rangement, and proportions, and have attained a certain style and character before they could have been deemed objects worthy of imitation. If the Doric order could be attributed to an inventor, that inventor was a people among whom similar wants existed for a long period, and among whom a style of building was retained suitable to the climate and the habits of their life, and one which time slowly and gradually modified and brought to per- fection, on principles rendered sacred by custom. The system of imitation in the Doric order has the ap- pearance of having been founded on the elementary forms of the hut; but it was guided, if that really be the case, by the same principles which Nature herself adopts in her works, without the aid of which no bounds could have been set to the imagination and caprice of its improvers. In the copy no part can be said to be precisely similar to the model; the former displays sentiment, not calculation. The triglyphs and metopes, which are said to represent what in the original were the ends of beams and the spaces between them, are generally found only in the exterior of the building. The inclination of the mutules, originating, as it is said, in the slope of the rafters, is still preserved, though the front in which they appear be of a nature to require a horizontal arrangement of them. These things show that the artists at least adopted a free and not a servile imitation of the primitive types. One cannot, 62 The Five Orders of Architecture GRECIAN ARCHITECTURE PLATE IH The Five Orders of Architecture 63 however, refrain from observing that on an inspection of Denon's plate of the Portico of the Temple of Tentyris, in the entablature whereof are to be found projections and intervals in its upper division, bearing a striking resem- blance to the arrangement of the Doric frieze, a suspicion is induced that the usual hypothesis wants stronger con- firmation than it has generally seemed to require. It is true that the projections in question are in the form of reeds, but the general effect, especially when we observe the way in which the intervals are ornamented, cannot fail to bring to mind the arrangement of the Doric Frieze and Cornice, not to mention the reeding at the external angles, which corresponds with the angular triglyphs of the Doric order. The introduction of the angular triglyph seems to have been an anomaly which could not have arisen, had the primitive type been what we have just seen. What could be more absurd than to give the end of the same beam two faces at right angles with its longitudinal direc- tion. ' On the supposition of the type being the hut, and of the detail of the order being derived from the component parts of a hut, the Komans, and afterwards the restorers of art in Italy, were justified in altering this defect, which was the father of many more, in the arrangement of the intercolumniations. It is almost needless to observe that the materials of Egyptian architecture, from the great scarcity of wood in the country, must have generally been stone or brick. The large blocks of the former material precluded the necessity of making timber roofs, and it is therefore hardly reasonable to seek the origin of the pro- jections of the entablature at Tentyris, and of other more ancient examples, in the ends of beams. Proportions, and the rules necessary to be observed for the purpose of giving them elegance and effect, are only necessary to preserve uniformity in the principals on which 64 The Five Orders of Architecture GRECIAN ARCHITECTURE '' "ll ' i ' i 1 *ttb* JAV* PLATE IV The Five Orders of Architecture 65 we proceed, and for preventing too great a latitude of imagination in the productions of art. We may be assured that whenever these become so fixed in any coun- try, that its artists feel fettered by the restrictions which too rigid an adherence to ancient rules imposes, invention and taste are extinguished. The extraordinary difference which we find in the proportions and parts of the same order, plainly shows that the artists of Greece considered themselves restricted only in the general proportions. It has been recently discovered that the columns of the Parthenon have an entasis or swelling. An examination of several examples with the view of comparing them with each other, would be not only extremely interesting but would serve to illustrate Vitruvius on this point, which was a refinement in art, though perhaps not early prac- tised. It might perhaps determine the comparative ages of buildings more satisfactorily than any of the means which have hitherto been resorted to for that purpose. In the Temples of Passtum, Corinth, and Segesta, the intercolumniations are about equal to the diameter of the column, and they are nearly the same at the Parthenon. At the Temple of Theseus they exceed that width by about a quarter of a diameter, and in an example at Syracuse they are somewhat less than a diameter. Two or three smaller matters remain to be noticed. These are the varieties in the forms of the echinus of the capital, and in those of the flutes. The echinus is some- times inclined at once inward by a straight line, or by a slight curve without any double flexure. It is sometimes very much extended in its projection from the shaft; whilst in other examples we find it nearly approaching the quarter round of the Eomans. "When curved, the contour will be found composed of segments of curves formed by the section of a cone. The form of the flutes on the plan 66 The Five Orders of Architecture is variable; we sometimes find them segments of circles, and at other times they are of a curvilinear form, partak- ing somewhat of the ellipsis. Their number also varies. In the examples at Athens, the number is twenty; whilst at Passtum the exterior order of the great temple has twenty-four, the lower interior order twenty, and the upper interior only sixteen. Those who from a passage in the Odyssey have discov- ered that the fluting of columns was made for the purpose of receiving and holding the spears of the persons whose duties led them to the temple, and that this want gave rise to the invention, do great injustice to the ingenuity of the Grecians. It is here unnecessary to argue in refuta- tion of so strange a conjecture. We will only in passing observe, that a more inconvenient place for the armory could not possibly be assigned than such a situation, nor one where obstruction would have been more unnecessarily created than in the one comparatively narrow intercolumnia- tions of the Grecian temple; nor one, if the spears were to stand in contact with the recess of the channel, in which they would have been more liable to be constantly dis- placed by accident. It is probable that the fluting is nothing more than an improvement which Grecian refine- ment would make on the polygonal column of Egypt. Until after the defeat of Xerxes, when the active spirit of the Athenians languished for an object, we do not find that singular elegance in their works of fine arts, which through the exertions and fostering hand of Pericles ap- pered about 430 years before Christ. The Peloponnesians and their colonies ha'd erected the temples at Corinth, Nemea, Paestum, Syracuse, and other places in Sicily. Prom the introduction of architecture into Greece, a period of little more than three centuries elapsed before it The Five Orders of Architecture 67 burst forth with astonishing lustre, and was raised to the summit of perfection. In the country that gave birth to the Doric order, speak- ing of it as applied to Greece generally, it is not difficult to imagine that the art was not destined to be restrained within the limits of a single order, it was in truth impos- sible that it would have remained within such narrow bounds. It is more than probable that the orders advanced almost pari passu, and it would be difficult to prove that the Ionic order is of much less antiquity than that which has just been examined. Except in the capitals of the Ionic and Corinthian orders, one can scarcely say in which of the three the greatest degree of richness is manifest, more especially when we consider how exquisitely the metopes were sometimes decorated. On a glance at the capitals in question, and a comparison of them with many examples of the corresponding member in Egyptian Architecture, one would suppose there can be no doubt on their origin. It may be, and is, indeed, true, that the Ionian colonies gave a preference to the Ionic Order; so did the Eomans to the Corinthian, and yet whoever said that the Eomans invented the Corinthian order? The same species of variety which has been noticed in the different examples exhibited of the Doric, is not less observable in those of the Ionic order, as may be seen by a comparison of the Ionic edifices of Athens with those on the coast of Asia Minor; but it is not necessary to enter into the subject so much at length as we have done in re- spect to the Doric order. Aware that the angular Ionic capital has its admirers, it may be proper to state that many men of taste are of a different opinion, and that it has been thought a defect which should be avoided in modern works. In a peripteral 68 The Five Orders of Architecture CRECIAN ARCHITECTURE .% £crttA/c/£m//fe,Jz6u THE DORIC ORDSM l.f &l PLATE XVI The Five Orders of Architecture 109 is but of modern adoption, the ancients never having con- sidered it as a distinct order. It is a mixture of the Ionic and Corinthian, and is now distinguished by the names of Eoman, or Composite. The ingenuity of man has hitherto not been able to produce a sixth order, though large premiums have been offered, and numerous attempts been made by men of first- rate talents to accomplish it. Such is the fettered human imagination, such the scanty store of its ideas, that Doric, Ionic and Corinthian have ever floated uppermost, and all that has ever been produced amounts to nothing more than different arrangements and combinations of their parts, with some trifling deviations scarcely deserving notice, the whole generally tending more to diminish than to in- crease the beauty of the ancient orders. The substitution of cocks, owls, or lion's heads, etc., for roses, of trophies, cornucopias, lilies, sphinxes, or even men, women and children for volutes, the introduction of feathers, lyres, flower de luces, or coronets for leaves are more alterations than improvements; and the suspension of festoons of flowers, or collars of knighthood, over the other enrichments of a capital, like lace on embroidery, rather tends to complicate and confuse the form than to augment its grace or contribute to its excellence. The suppression of parts of the ancient orders, with a view to produce novelty, has of late years been practiced among us with full as little success. And though it is not wished to restrain sallies of imagination, nor to discourage genius from attempting to invent, yet it is apprehended that attempts to alter the primary forms invented by the ancients, and established by the concurring approbation of many ages, must ever be attended with dangerous conse- quences, must always be difficult, and seldom, if ever, suc- cessful. It is like coining words, which, whatever may 110 The Five Orders of Architecture r-.jf jfrfjtfj * tPi i 1 LXJO 1 H 'St? PLATE XVII The Five Orders of Architecture 111 be their value, are at first but ill received, and must have the sanction of time to secure them a current reception. An order is composed of two principal members, the column and the entablature, each of which is divided into three principal parts. Those of the column are the base, the shaft and the capital; those of the entablature are the architrave, the frieze, and the cornice. All these are again subdivided into many smaller parts, the disposition, num- ber, forms and dimensions of which characterize each other, and express the degree of strength or delicacy, richness or simplicity, peculiar to it. The simplest and most solid of all is the Tuscan. It is composed of few and large parts, devoid of ornaments, and is of a construction so massive that it seems capable of supporting the heaviest burdens, and has been compared to a sturdy laborer dressed in homely apparel. The Doric order, next in strength to the Tuscan, and of a grave, robust, masculine aspect, is by Scamozzi called the Herculean. Being the most ancient of all orders, it re- tains more of the structure of the primitive buildings in its form than any of the rest, having triglyphs in the frieze to represent the ends of joists and mutules in its cornice, to represent rafters with inclined soffits, to express their di- rection in the originals, from which they were imitated. Its column, too, is often seen in ancient works, executed without a base, in imitation of the trees used in the first buildings, without any plinths to raise them above the ground. Preart de Chambria, speaking of this order, ob- serves that delicate ornaments are repugnant to its char- acteristic solidity, and that it succeeds best in the simple regularity of its proportions. "Nosegays and garlands of flowers," says he, "grace not a Hercules, who always ap- pears more becomingly with a rough club and lion's skin; for there are beauties of various sorts, and often so dis- 112 The Five Orders of Architecture the Ionic order. : //I * J .j f((^ — s ! T ■ VI *s£62#fr eAtf^ CeAdav'. • M ,*M,*' 1 PLATE XVIII « 4tX**fe/ The Five Orders of Architecture 113 similar in their natures that those which may be highly proper on one occasion may be quite the reverse, even ridiculously absurd, on others." - — The Ionic, being the second of the Grecian orders, holds a middle station between the other two, and stands in equipoise between the grave solidity of the Doric and the elegant delicacy of the Corinthian. Among the antiques^ however, we find it in different dresses; sometimes plenti- fully adorned, and inclining most towards the Corinthian; sometimes more simple, and bordering on Doric plainness, all according to the fancy of the architect or nature of the structure where employed. It is throughout of a more slender construction than either of the afore-described or- ders; its appearance, though simple, is graceful and majestic; its ornaments should be few, rather neat than luxuriant, and as there ought to be nothing exaggerated, or affectedly striking in any of its parts, is it, not unaptly, compared to a sedate matron, rather in decent than mag- nificent attire. "The Corinthian," says Sir Henry Wotton, "is a column lasciviously decked, like a wanton courtezan. Its pro- portions are elegant in the extreme, every part of the order is divided into a great variety of members, and abundantly enriched with a diversity of ornaments." "The ancients," says De Chambria, "aiming at the representation of a feminine beauty, omitted nothing either calculated to em- bellish or capable of perfecting their work." And he ob- serves, "that in the many examples left to this order such a profusion of different ornaments is introduced that they seem to have exhausted imagination in the contrivance of decorations for this masterpiece of the art. Scamozzi calls it the Virginal, and it certainly has all the delicacy in its form, with all the gaiety, gaudiness, and affectation, in ita dress peculiar to young women." 114 The Five Orders of Architecture The Composite order, being, properly speaking, only a different species of the Corinthian, distinguished from it merely by some peculiarities in the capital, or other trifling deviations, retains in a great measure the same character, and requires no particular description. To give a striking idea of these different properties, and to render the comparison between the orders more easy, I have represented them all of the same height, by which means the gradual increase of delicacy and richness is easily perceivable, as are likewise the relations between the intercolumniations of the different orders and the propor- tions which their pedestals, imposts, archivolts, and other parts with which they are on various occasions accompanied, bear to each other. The proportions of the orders were by the ancients formed on these of the human body, and consequently it could not be their intention to make a Corinthian column, which, as Vitruvius observes, is to represent the delicacy of a young girl, as thick and much taller than a Doric one, which is designed to represent the bulk and vigor of a muscular full-grown man. Columns so formed could not be applied to accompany each other without violating the laws both of real and apparent solidity, as in such case the. Doric dwarf must be crushed under the strapping Ionic, or gi- gantic Corinthian virago, triumphantly rising uppermost, and reversing the natural, the necessary predominance in the composition. Nevertheless Vignola, Palladio, Scamozzi, Blondel, Parrault, and many others, if not all the great modern artists, have considered them in this light; that is, they have made the diameters of all their orders the same, and consequently their heights increasing, which, besides, giving a wrong idea of the character of these different com- positions, has laid a foundation for many erroneous pre- The Five Orders of Architecture cepts and false reasonings to be found in different parts of their works, of which notice will in due time be taken. In the opinion of Scamozzi, columns should not be less than seven of their diameters in height, nor more than ten ; the former being, according to him, a good proportion in the Tuscan, and the latter in the Corinthian order. The practice of the ancients in their best works being com- formable to this precept, in this treatise, as authorized by the doctrine of Vitruvius, I have made the Tuscan column seven diameters in height, and the Doric eight, the Ionic nine, as Palladio and Vignola have done, and the Corin- thian and Composite ten; which last measure is a mean between the proportions observed in the Pantheon, and at the three columns in the Campo Vaccino, both of which are esteemed most excellent models of the Corinthian order. The height of the entablature, in all the orders, I have made one-quarter of the height of the column, which was the common practice of the ancients, who, in all sorts of entablatures, seldom exceeded or fell much short of that measure. Nevertheless Palladio, Scamozzi, Alberti, Barbaro, Cataneo, Delorme, and others of the modern architects, have made their entablatures much lower in the Ionic, Composite and Corinthian orders, than in the Tuscan or Doric. This, on some occasions, may not only be excusable, but highly proper, particularly where the intercolumnia- tions are wide, as in a second or third order, in private houses, or inside decorations, where lightness should be preferred to dignify, and where expense, with every im- pediment to the conveniency of the fabric, are carefully to be avoided, but to set entirely abide a proportion which seems to have had the general approbation of the ancient artists, is surely presuming too far. The reason alleged in favor of this practice is the weak- 116 The Five Orders of Architecture J&u&S 12&€#>uded'. flf 1 Dtatt tin:. CoAcOu F C wlwtf. Uatyttt must tt^i.af n 1 *- tUJii CA.CB uil«iJ 4,,wJ .w>h.iJj C,2 C.'.i,,wjJ J.if.J,: rnu /uk cf«k> S«imj«'1.4 jft-U.:(Aj.v ,rf" cftc F-tae. /Vvm rie rtwt £*»» 1 wiiA t/to J«r»/ U'.^iJf y QuaJ.,»u F G 'i ,'m iffi* yuvnj Ovtftv X, fnM rie lt&rreL 2 G Jtso-ibo the Quoirum G B — * tanOiautio Ok tame. eprmsUm I'.-m ,ill die OmJre Chares, fAo Cei&ovr of the Volute tnS h> timptetat. fig t the. CiMrr.r tbr iucnivy thx rMoC are found in thu neivxor, Cerutrvoc « Trtmolt *f nhufi f tUc A ? */ rfWZ W (Ac />- « ,/ M. ( j//«Yn/ mnU&izA, frtwwi AF. ,»f./ nV <;V. F V 09*1/ « C I. <•>• "V- /t^e A F #•/.«". / lul~*>r 1 S Q-ent-Y towards A. a;i*j/. < fhr Viovxer <■/ ihi iSye A B divuk it into dtxe .*-/tLtl pert, . and throuah tfw points cf Urisitn /rm* fact purettf •»dWIh»iuxa-ED.w*«;A u-iH tut tfie Jfiogm^U C.2, C3,W reu**iO- toe itmin new £nBw.nVm Mhota «*o PLATS XIX The Five Orders of Architecture 117 ness of the columns in the delicate orders, which renders them unfit for supporting heavy burdens ; and where the in- tervals are fixed, as in a second order, or in other places, where wide intercolumniations are either necessary or not to be avoided, the reason is certainly sufficient; but if the artist is at liberty to dispose his columns at pleasure, the simplest and most natural way of conquering the difficulty is to employ more columns, by placing them nearer to each other, as was the custom of the ancients. And it must be remembered that though the height of the entablature in a delicate order is made the same as in a massive one, yet it will not, either in reality or appearance, be equally heavy ; for the quantity of matter in the Corinthian cornice, A, is considerably less than in the Tuscan cornice, B; Plate XIV. and the increased number of parts composing the former of these will, of course, make it appear far lighter than the latter. With regard to the parts of the entablature I have fol- lowed the method of Serlio, in his Ionic and Corinthian orders, and of Parrault, who, in all his orders, excepting the Doric, divides the whole height of the entablature into ten equal parts, three of which he gives to the architrave, three to the frieze, four to the cornice; and in the Doric order he divides the whole height of the entablature into eight parts, of which two are given to the architrave, three to the frieze, and three to the cornice. These measures deviate very little from those observed in the greatest number of antiques now extant at Rome, where they have stood the test of many ages; and their simplicity renders them singularly useful in composition, as they are easily remembered and easily applied. Of two manners used by architects to determine the di- mensions of the moldings, and the lesser parts that com- pose an order, I have chosen the simplest, readiest, and 118 The Five Orders of Architecture i£w &*&/&£**£ g^af^/^t- '£/*.!*, ,&rwCn£iJ&&.uy£b'ff!a#/uxid/tu*Nttt. s GTB ? n < * VlfatHU-' PLATE XX The Five Orders of Architecture 119 most accurate, which is, by the module or semi-diameter of the column, taken at the bottom of the shaft, and di- vided into thirty minutes. There are, indeed, many who prefer the method of meas- uring by equal parts, imagining beauty to depend on the simplicity and accuracy of the relations existing between the whole body and its members, and alleging that di- mensions which have evident affinities are better remem- bered than those whose relations are too complicated to be immediately apprehended. With regard to the former of these suppositions it is evidently false, for the real relations subsisting between dissimilar figures have no connection with the apparent ones; and with regard to the latter it may or may not be the case, according to the degree of accuracy with which the partition is made; for instance, in dividing the Attic base, which may be numbered among the simplest compositions in architecture, according to the different methods, it ap pears to me as easy to recollect the numbers 10, 7%, 1, 4%, 1, 5% as to remember that the whole height of the base is to be divided into three equal parts; that two of these three are to be divided into four, that three of the four are to be divided into two, and that one of the two is to be divided into six, which are to be divided into three. But admitting it were easier to remember the one than the other, it does not seem necessary nor even advisable, in a science where a vast diversity of knowledge is required, to burden the memory with a thousand trifling dimensions. If the general proportions be known, it is all that is requisite in composing, and when a design is to be executed it is easy to have recourse to figured drawings or to prints. The use of the module is universal throughout the order and all its appurtenances; it marks their relations to each other, and being susceptible of the minutest divisions, the 120 The Five Orders of Architecture dimensions may be speedily determined with the utmost accuracy, while the trouble, confusion, uncertainty, and loss of time in measuring by equal parts are very considerable, seeing it is necessary to form almost as many different scales as there are different parts to be divided. Columns, in imitation of trees, from which they drew their origin, are tapered in their shafts. In the antiques the diminution is variously performed, sometimes beginning from the foot of the shaft, at others from one-quarter or one-third of its height, the lower part being left perfectly cylindrical. The former of these methods was most in use amongst the ancients, and being the most natural, seems to claim the preference, though the latter has been almost universally practised by modern artists, from a supposition, perhaps, of its being more graceful, as it is more marked and strikingly perceptible. "The first architects," says Mons. Auzoult, "probably made their columns in straight lines, in imitation of trees, so that their shaft was a f rustrum of the cone ; but finding this form abrupt and disagreeable, they made use of some curve, which, springing from the extremities of the superior and inferior diameters of the column, swelled beyond the sides of the cone, and, by that means, gave a more pleasing figure to the outline. Vitruvius, in the second chapter of his third book, mentions this practice but in so obscure and cursory a manner that his meaning has not been under- stood; and several of the modern architects, intending to conform themselves to his doctrine, have made the diametera of their columns greater in the middle than at the foot of the shaft. Leon Baptista Alberti, with others of the Florentine and Eoman architects, carried this practice to a very absurd excess, for which they have been justly blamed as it is neither natural, reasonable, nor beautiful." Monsieur Auzoult further observes "that a column, sup- The Five Orders of Architecture 121 posing its shaft to be the frustrum of a cone, may have an additional thickness in the middle, without being swelled there, beyond the bulk of its inferior parts; and supposes the addition mentioned by Vitruvius to signify nothing more than the increase towards the middle of the column, occasioned by changing the straight line, which at first was in use, into a curve." This supposition is exceedingly just, and founded on what is observable in the works of antiquity, where there is no single instance of a column thicker in the middle than at the bottom, though all, or most of them, have the swell- ing hinted at by Vitruvius, all of them being terminated by curves, some few granite columns excepted, which are bounded by straight lines; a proof, perhaps, of their antiquity, or of their having been wrought in the quarries of Egypt by unskilful workmen. Blondel in his book, entitled "Eesolution des quatre principaux Problemes d' Architecture," teaches various manners of diminishing columns, the best and simplest of which is by means of the instrument invented by Nicomedes to describe the first conchoid; for this, being applied at the bottom of the shaft, performs at one sweep both the swelling and the diminution, giving such a graceful form to the column that it is universally allowed to be the most perfect practice hitherto discovered. The columns in the Pantheon, accounted the most beautiful among the antiques, are traced in this manner, as appears by the exact measures of one of them, to be found in Desgodetz's Antiquities of Eome. To give an accurate idea of the operation it will be neces- sary first to describe Vignola's method of diminution, on which it is grounded. "As to this second method," says Vignola, "it is a discovery of my own ; and although it be less known than the former it will be easily comprehended l'?2 The Five Orders of Architect ure IhyMSJu&iflB n ^ViirTi'j i iTTJ' in")" r •mmamun n masm^ - tbb cohmtelin '4 F^^^^0^^f^^¥^ " ORDER . Tim fff the t'dfim PLATE XXI The- Five Orders of Architecture 123 by the figure. Having therefore determined the measures of your column (that is to say, the height of the shaft, and its inferior and superior diameters), draw a line in- definitely from C plate XIII., through D, perpendicular to the axis of the column;" this done, set off the distance C D, which is the inferior semi-diameter, from A, the ex- treme point of the superior semi^diameter, to B, a point in the axis. Then from A, through B, draw the line ABE, which will cut the indefinite line C D in E ; and from this point of intersection, E, draw through the axis of the column any number of rays as E B A, on each of which, from the axis towards the circumference, setting off the interval C D, you may find any number of points, a, a, a, through which, if a curve be drawn, it will describe the swelling and diminution of the column. Though this method be sufficiently accurate for prac- tice, especially if a considerable number of points be found, yet, strictly speaking, it is defective, as the curve must either be drawn by hand or by applying a flexible ruler to all the points, both which are liable to variations. Blondel, therefore, to obviate this objection (after having proved the curve passing from A to C through the points a, a, to be of the same nature with the first conchoid of the ancients), employed the instrument of Nicomedes to describe it, the construction of which is as follows: — Having determined, as above, the length of the shaft with the inferior and superior diameters of the column, and having likewise found the length of the line C D E, take three rulers, either of wood or metal, as F G, I D, and A H ; of which let E G and I D be fastened together at right angles in G; cut a dove-tail groove in the middle of F G, from top to bottom, and at the point E on the ruler I D (whose distance from the middle of the groove in F G is the same as that of the point of intersection from the axis 124 The Five Orders of Architecture TKF COtltNTBtAST OBOBR />vm ckl Ctmplc efJl'eiTEH SlA Ti>/t I* 4 Jr.; >**. PLATE XXII The Five Orders of Architecture 125 of the column) fix a pin; then on the rule A H set off the distance A B, equal to C D the inferior semi-diameter of the column, and at the point B fix a button, whose head must be exactly fitted to the groove made in F G, in which it is to slide ; and at the other extremity of the ruler A H, cut a slit or channel from H to K, whose length must not be less than the difference of length between E B and E D, and whose breadth must be sufficient to admit the pin fixed at E, which must pass through the slit, that the ruler may slide thereon. The instrument being thus completed, if the middle of the groove, in the ruler P G, be placed exactly over the axis of the column, it is evident that the ruler A H, in moving along the groove, will, with its extremity A, de- scribe the curve A aaa C, which curve is the same as that produced by Vignola's method of diminution, supposing it done with the utmost accuracy ; for the interval A, B, a, b, is always the same, and the point E is the origin of an infinity of lines, of which the parts B A, b a, b a, extending from the axis to the circumference, are equal to each other, and to D C. And if the rulers be of an indefinite size, and the pins at E and B be made to move along their respective ruler, so that the intervals A B and D E may be augmented or diminished at pleasure, it is likewise evident that the same instrument may be thus applied to columns of any size." In the remains of antiquity the quantity of the diminu- tion is various, but seldom less than one-eighth of the inferior diameter of the column, nor more than one-sixth of it. The last of these is by Yitruvius esteemed the most perfect, and Vignola has employed it in four of his orders, as I have done in all of them, there being no reason for diminishing the Tuscan column more, in proportion to its diameter, than any of the rest ; though it be the doctrine 126 The Fire Orders of Architecture TBE ROMMf. OR COMPOSITE ORDER r/.ut J du &r*A '"UK \iUmunaei PLATE XXIII The Five Orders of Architecture 127 of Vitruvius, and the practice of Palladio, Vignola, Sca- mozzi, and almost all the modern architects. On the con- trary as Monsieur Parrault justly observes, its diminution ought rather to be less than more, as it actually is in the Trajan column, being there only one-ninth of the diameter. For even when the same proportion is observed through all the orders, the absolute quantity of the diminution in the Tuscan order, supposing the columns of the same height, exceeds that in the Corinthian in the ratio of ten to seven ; and if, according to the common practice, the Tuscan col- umn be less by one-quarter at the top than at its foot, the difference between the diminution in the Tuscan and in the Corinthian columns will be as fifteen to seven, and in the Tuscan and Doric nearly as fifteen to nine; so that, not- withstanding there is a very considerable difference between the lower diameters of a Tuscan and of a Doric column, both being of the same height, yet the diameters at their top will be nearly equal, and consequently the Tuscan column will in reality be no stronger than the Doric one, which is contrary to the character of the order. Vitruvius allots different degrees of diminution to col- umns of different heights, giving to those of fifteen foot, one-sixth of their diameter; to such as are from twenty to thirty foot, one-seventh; and when they are from forty to fifty foot high, one-eighth only, observing that as the eye is easily deceived in considering distant objects, which al- ways seem less than they really are, it is necessary to rem- edy the deception by an increase of their dimensions, other- wise the work will appear ill-constructed and disagreeable to the eye. Most of the modern architects have taught the same doctrine, but Perrault in his notes, both on this passage an.l on the second chapter of the sixth book, endeavors to prove the absurdity thereof. In fact, it is on most oc- 128 The Five Orders of Architecture Ctm&i#M& dte/*Jt!a£e4G* Sj Ltyie/aZi Trqiduv i?«set Cfiabl PLATE XXV The Five Orders of Architecture 129 casions, if not on all, an evident error, which Vitruvius and his followers have probably been led into through neglect of combining circumstances. For if the validity of Perrault's arguments be not assented to, and it is required to judge according to the rigor of optical laws, it must be remembered that the proper point of view for a column of fifty foot high is not the same as for one of fifteen, but on the contrary more distant, in the same proportion, as the column is higher; and that consequently the apparent relation between the lower and upper diameters of the column will be the same, whatever be its size. For if we suppose A to be a point of view, whose respective dis- tance from each of the columns f g, F G, is equal to the respective heights of each the triangles f A g, F A G, will be similar ; and A f or A h, which is the same, will be to A g, as A F, or its equal AH is to AG; therefore if d e be in reality to b c as D E is to B C it will likewise be ap- parently so; for the angle d A e will then be to the angle b A c as the angle D A E is to the angle B A C, and if the real relations differ the apparent ones will likewise differ. I have supposed the eye of the spectator to be in a line perpedicular to the foot of the shaft; but if the col- umns be proportionably raised to any height above the eye the argument will still remain in force, as the point of view must of course be proportionably more distant; and even when columns are placed immediately on the ground, which seldom or ever is the case, the alteration occasioned by that situation is too trifling to deserve notice. When, therefore, a certain degree of diminution, which by experience is fou/»d pleasing, has been fixed upon, there will be no necessity for changing it, whatever be the height (of the column, provided the point of view is not limited; but in close places, where the spectator is not at liberty to choose a proper distance for his point of sight, the archi- 130 The Five Orders of Architecture tect if he inclines to be scrupulously accurate, may vary; though it is in reality a matter of no importance, as the nearness of the object will render the image thereof indis- tinct, and consequently any small alteration imperceptible.) Scamozzi, who esteems it an essential property of the delicate orders to exceed the massive ones in height, has applied the above-cited precept of Vitruvius to the different orders, having diminished the Tuscan column one-quarter of its diameter, the Doric one-fifth, the Ionic one-sixth, the Eoman one-seventh, and the Corinthian one-eighth. In the foregoing part of this chapter I have shown the fallacy of his notion with respect to the heights of his orders, and likewise endeavored to prove the error of diminishing the Tuscan column more than any of the others, so that it will be needless to say anything further on these subjects now ; for as the case is similar, the same arguments may be employed in confutation thereof. My intention being to give an exact idea of the orders of the ancients, I have represented them under such fig- ures and proportions as appear to have been most in use in the esteemed works of the Romans, who, in the opinion of Leon Bap. Alberti, and other eminent writers, carried architecture to its perfection. It must not, however, be imagined that the same general proportions, will, on all occasions, succeed. They are chiefly collected from the temples and other public structures of antiquity, and may by us be employed in churches, palaces, and other buildings of magnificence, where majesty and grandeur of manner should be extended to their utmost limits, and where, the whole composition being generally large, the parts require an extraordinary degree of boldness to make them distinctly perceptible from the proper general points of view. But in less considerable edifices, and under various circum- stances of which I shall hereafter give a detail, more elegant proportions may often be preferable. OP THE TUSCAN ORDER. PLATE XV. Among the antiques there are no remains of a Tegular Tuscan order; the doctrine of Vitruvius upon that subject is obscure; and the profiles of Palladio, Scamozzi, Serlio, Delorme and Vignola, are all, more or less imperfect. Of the two designs left us by Palladio, that taken from the description of Vitruvius is unpleasingly rustic. The other, again, is too rich, and injudiciously composed. That of Scamozzi is yet richer, and much too like the Doric. Serlio's is heavy; and Vignola's, though superior to the others, is defective in the cornice, which is clumsy com- pared with the rest of the order, ill-proportioned in its parts, and incorrectly profiled, as it finishes with a support- ing molding, which has nothing to support, and conse- quently must excite the idea of a mutilation; the more striking, as the general outline of the composition re- sembles exactly the bed molds of the Ionic cornice, sup- posing the dentil band left uncut, as is often the case. In the design here annexed I have chiefly imitated Vignola's, who in this order has been almost universally followed. Even Inigo Jones, who was so close an adherer to Palladio, has employed Vignola's profile in his York Stairs, and others, his buildings. But as the cornice ap- pears to me far inferior to the rest of the composition I have not scrupled to reject it, and to substitute in its place that of Scamozzi, with such alterations as were evidently necessary to render it perfect. Comformably to the doctrine of Vitruvius, and to the almost general prac- tice of the moderns, I have given to the height of the 131 132 The Five Orders of Architecture column fourteen modules or seven diameters, and to that of the whole entablature, three and a half modules ; which being divided into ten equal parts, three of them are for the height of the architrave, three for that of the frieze, and the remaining four for the cornice. The capital is in height one module, the base, including the lower cincture of the shaft, is also one module, and the shaft, with its up- per cincture and astragal, twelve modules. These are the general measures of the order. With respect to the particular dimensions of the minuter parts, they may be collected from the design, whereon the heights and projections of each member are figured, the latter of these being counted from perpendiculars raised at the extremities of the inferior and superior diameters of the shaft — a method preferable to that of De Chambrai and Desgodetz, who count from the axis of the column, be- cause the relation between the heights and projections of the parts are more readily discoverable, and whenever a cornice or entablature is to be executed without a column, which frequently happens, it requires no additional time or labor, as the trouble of deducting from each dimension, the semi-diameter of the column is saved. Scamozzi, that his bases might be of the same height in all the orders, has given to the Tuscan one, exclusive of the cincture, half a diameter, but I have rather chosen to imitate Vignola and Palladio, who in this order have deviated from the general rule, for as the Tuscan base is composed of two members only, instead of six, which con- stitute the other bases, it becomes much too clumsy when the same general proportion is observed. The Tuscan order admits of no ornaments of any kind ; on the contrary it is sometimes customary to represent on the shaft of its column rustic cinctures, as at the Palace Pitti in Florence, that of the Luxembourg in Paris, York The Five Orders of Architecture 133 _s*<<«4>&/ anit- (sJeafa&trrw er^^a^lr- LtzAt/aZi. .-Jascarn . S^enc/ i^enus n X ■U TrejetfB! =? ■vAa^' y^2&&& JZ&&&&j/vr^>i!/ foe/enf.. PLATE XXV 134 The Five Orders of Architecture Stairs in London, and many other buildings of note. This practice, though frequent, and to be found in the works of many celebrated architects, is not always excusable, and should be indulged with caution, as it hides the natural figure of the column, alters its proportions, and affects the simplicity of the whole composition. There are few ex- amples of these bandages in the remains of antiquity, and in general it will be advisable to avoid them in all large designs, reserving the rustic work for the intercolumnia- tions, where it may be employed with great propriety to produce an opposition which will help to render the aspect of the whole composition distinct and striking. But in smaller works of which the parts being few are easily comprehended, they may be sometimes tolerated, sometimes even recommended, as they serve to diversify the forms, are productive of strong contrasts, and contribute very considerably to the masculine, bold aspect of the com- position. Le Clerc thinks them proper in gates of citadels and prisons, of which the entrances should be terrific, and they are likewise fit for gates to gardens or parks, for grottos, fountains, and baths, where elegance of form and neatness of workmanship would be out of character. De- lorme, who was exceedingly fond of these cinctures, has employed them in several parts of the Tuileries, covered with arms, cyphers, and other enrichments; but this seems absurd, for they can never be considered in any other light than as parts, which, to avoid expense and trouble, were left unfinished. We likewise find in different parts of the Louvre vermiculated rustics, of which the tracks rep- resent flowers de luce and other regular figures, — a practice still more unnatural than the forementioned, though Monsieur D'Aviler very gravely tells us that it should al- ways be done with propriety, and express a relation to the owner of the structure ; that is the figures should represent The Five Orders of Arrhiiertvre 135 J^ZewtamJ a*i&Wa>ry '. fLATE XXVI 136 The Five Orders of Architecture his arms, his crest, motto, cypher, and so forth, as if worms were draughtsmen and understood heraldry. In the plates of designs for gates, doors and windows, and likewise in those of different compositions, at the end of the book, are given several designs of rustic columns, and other rustic work; all collected from buildings of note in different parts of Europe ; and for the manner of executing them, as it cannot well be described, the student is referred to various parts of Somerset Place, to the Horse Guards, the Treasury, the Doric entrance of the King's Mews, the gate of Burlington House, etc. ; in all which, the different kinds of rustication are managed with taste and command of the chisel. De Chambria, in the introduction to his parallel of an- cient and modern architecture, treats the Tuscan order with great contempt, and banishes it to the country, as unworthy a place, either in temples or palaces ; but in the second part of the same work, he is more indulgent, for though he re- jects the entablature, the column is taken into favor, "and compared to a queen seated on a throne, surrounded with all the treasures of fame, and distributing honors to her minions, while other columns only seem to be servants and slaves of the buildings they support." The remainder of this passage, too long to be here in- serted at full length, is calculated to degrade and totally to exclude from buildings, the Tuscan order, but by a dif- ferent mode of employing and dressing the column, to exalt its consequence, increase its majesty and beauty, so as to stand an advantageous comparison with any of the rest. He therefore wishes, in imitation of the ancient archi- tects, to consecrate the Tuscan column to the commemora- tion of great men and their glorious actions, instancing Trajan's column, one of the proudest monuments of Eoman splendor, which is of that order, was erected by the senate The Five Orders of Architecture 137 138 The Five Orders of Architecture and people of Kome, in acknowledgment of his services, and has contributed more to immortalize that emperor than the united pen of all historians. He further instances the Antonine Pius, and another of the same sort at Constan- tinople, raised to the emperor Theodosius, after his victory over the Scythians ; both which prove, by their resemblance to the Trajan column, that this sort of appropriation, recommended by him, had passed into a rule among the ancient masters of the art. I shall not here dispute the justness of M. De Chambria's remarks, but may venture to affirm that not only the Tuscan column, but the whole order, as represented in the annexed design, which being in fact the production of Vignola and Scamozzi, I may praise without the imputation of vanity, is extremely beautiful, — a useful, even necessary gradation in the art, and for its purposes, inferior to none of the rest. The Tuscan order, as it conveys ideas of strength and rustic simplicity, is very proper for rural purposes, and may be employed in farm-houses, in barns, and sheds for imple- ments of husbandry, in stables, maneges, and dog-kennels, in greenhouses, grottos, and fountains, in gates of parks and gardens, and generally wherever magnificence is not required and expense is to be avoided. Serlio recommends the use thereof in prisons, arsenals, treasuries, sea-ports and gates of fortified places; and Le Clerc observes, that though the Tuscan order, as treated by Vitruvius, by Palladio, and some others, ought to be entirely rejected, yet according to the composition of Vignola, there is a beauty in its simplicity which recommends it to notice, and en- titles it to a place both in private and public buildings, as in colonnades and porticos surrounding squares or markets, in granaries or storehouses, and even in royal palaces, to adorn the lower apartments, offices, stables, and other The Five Orders of Architecture 139 places where strength and simplicity are required, and where richer or more delicate orders would be improper. In conformity to the doctrine and practice before men- tioned, seven diameters, or fourteen modules, have been given to the height of the Tuscan column, a proportion very proper for rural or military works where an appear- ance of extraOidinary solidity is required; but in town buildings, intended for civil purposes, or in interior decora- tions, the height of the column may be fourteen and a half, or even fifteen modules, as Scamozzi makes it; which augmentation may be entirely in the shaft, without chang- ing any measures either of the base of capital. Nor need the entablature be altered, for as it is composed for few parts, it will be sufficiently bold, although its height be somewhat less than one-quarter of the height of the column. OF THE DOEIC OKDEK. PLATES XVI. AND XVII. In the parallel are given three profiles of the Doric order ; one of which is taken from the theatre of Marcellus, and the other two are copied by Pirro Ligorio, from various fragments of antiquity in and near Eome. Vignola's sec- ond Doric profile bears a near resemblance to the most beautiful of these, and was not improbably collected from the same antique which Ligorio copied, though it must be owned that Vignola has, in his composition, far exceeded the original, having omitted the many trivial, insignificant moldings with which that is overloaded, and in various other respects improved both its form and proportions. This profile of Vignola, being composed in a greater style, and in a manner more characteristic of the order than any other, I have chosen for my model, having, in the general form and proportions, strictly adhered to the original, though in particular members I have not scrupled to vary, when observation taught me they might be improved. Vignola, as appears by the preface to his rules, supposed that the graceful and pleasing aspect of architectonic ob- jects was occasioned by the harmony and simplicity of the relations existing between their parts, and in composing his profiles he constantly regulates his measures by these simple affinities, imagining the deviations from them in his antique models to proceed rather from the inaccurate execution of the workmen than from any premeditated design in the contriver. To this notion may be ascribed many little de- fects in the proportions of his moldings and minuter mem- bers, which, though trifling in themselves, are yet, from the 140 The Five Orders of Architecture 141 smallness of the parts where they happen to be, of conse- quence, and easily perceivable by a judicious eye. These I have, therefore, endeavoured to correct, not only in this, but in others of his orders, which from their conformity to the best antiques, I have in the course of this work chosen to imitate. It has already been observed that the real relations sub- sisting between dissimilar figures have no connection with the apparent, the form and situation of the object viewed ever altering the affinity, and it is a truth too evident to require demonstration. No one will deny, for instance, that the ovolo in the annexed Doric cornice, viewed in its proper elevation, will appear much larger than the capital of the triglyph under and contiguous to it, though they are in reality nearly of the same dimensions; and if the same ovolo were placed as much below the level of the spectator's eye as it is in the present case above, it is like- wise evident that it would appear considerably lower than any flat member of the same height. These things being so, a strict attachment to harmonic relations seems entirely out of the question, since what is really in perfect harmony may, in appearance, produce the most jarring discord. Perfect proportion in architecture, if considered only with regard to the relations between the different objects in a composition, and as it merely relates to the pleasure of the sight, seems to consist in this — that those parts which are either principal or essential should be contrived to catch the eye successively from the most considerable to the least, according to their degrees of importance in the composition, and impress their images on the mind, before it is affected by any of the subservient members; yet, that these should be so conditioned as not to be entirely absorbed, but be capable of raising distinct ideas likewise, and such as H2 The Five Orders of Architecture may be adequate to the purposes for which these parts are designed. The different figures and situations of the parts may, in some degree, contribute toward this effect ; for simple forms will operate more speedily than those that are complicated, and such as project will be sooner perceived than such as are more retired; but dimension seems to be the pre- dominant quality, or that which acts most powerfully on the sense, and this, it is apprehended, can only be dis- covered by experience, at least to any degree of accuracy. When therefore a number of parts arranged in a particular manner, and under particular dimensions, excites, in the generality of judicious spectators, a pleasing sensation, it will be prudent on every occasion where the same circum- stances subsist, to observe exactly the same arrangement and proportions, notwithstanding they may in themselves appear irregular and unconnected. In composing the orders and other decorations which are contained in the present publication, this method has con- stantly been observed, the author having himself, with that view, measured with the utmost accuracy, and not without some danger, many ancient and modern celebrated build- ings, both at Rome and in other parts of Europe, strictly copying such things as appeared to be perfect, and carefully correcting others which seemed in any degree faulty ; relying therein not alone on his own judgment in doubtful cases, but much on the opinion and advice of several learned, in- genious artists of different nations, with whom he had the advantage of being intimately connected when abroad. Sensible he is that the extraordinary degree of accuracy which has been aimed at in these compositions is of little consequence to the generality of spectators, who see in the gross and feel by the lump. Nevertheless, as in poesy, music, painting, and indeed in all arts, there are delicacies which, The Five Orders of Architecture 143 <$rn}A&/7zstm&ur±Z&£c*&uj. town/num/ PLATE XXVm 144 The Five Orders of Architecture though they escape the vulgar notice, afford uncommon pleasure to persons of enlightened conception, so in achi- tecture this kind of perfection is the source of secondary pleasures, less forcible perhaps, but not always less de- lightful, than the first. These may be compared to those excited by the energy or graces of language in poetry; by the shakes, swells, inflections, and other artifices of the in- strument or voice, in music, which give sentiment and ex- pression to the performance ; or in painting, by a judicious choice and artful disposition of the objects, a nice dis- crimination of the passions, an elegant taste of design, and a spirited, masterly touch of the pencil. To all but local color and general resemblance, the unskilful are commonly blind; but the correct eye and ripened judgment derive their chief pleasure from that which the ignorant rarely perceive, and seldom or ever taste. It may perhaps be objected that the proportions here established, though proper and good on one occasion, may on many others be defective; but this objection will, I flatter myself, have little weight, when it is remembered that the situation of capitals and entablatures with respect to the order of which they are parts is constantly the same, and the points of view more or less distant, according to the size or elevation of the order; and that, consequently, the apparent magnitudes of all their parts will always have very nearly the same proportion to each other, even though they should be exalted to a second or third story. With regard to bases, indeed, their being placed on pedestals, or immediately on the ground, will occasion some little difference to their appearance; and when they are raised to a second story, their figure and apparent propor- tions will be considerably altered. Nevertheless it doth not seem necessary, in either of the?e cases, to vary their dimensions; for in the former of the two, the alteration The Five Orders of Architecture 145 would be trifling, and in the latter, the object being far removed from the eye, the spectator will rather be occupied in considering the general mass than in examining its parts, which, on account of their distance, cannot be distinctly perceptible. The height of the Doric column, including its capital and base, is sixteen modules, and the height of the entablature, four modules; the latter of which being di- vided into eight parts, two of them are given to the archi- trave, three to the frieze, and the remaining three to the cornice. In most of the antiques, the Doric column is executed without a base. Vitruvius likewise makes it without one; the base, according to that author, having been first em- ployed in the Ionic order, to imitate the sandal or covering of a woman's foot. Scamozzi blames this practice, and most of the moderns have been of his opinion, the greatest part of them having employed the Attic base in this order. Monsieur De Chambrai, however, whose blind attachment to the antique is, on many occasions, sufficiently evident, urges vehemently against this practice, which, as the order is formed upon the model of a strong man, who is con- stantly represented bare-footed, is according to him, very improper ; and "though" says he, "the custom of employing a base in contempt of all ancient authority, has by some unaccountable and false notions of beauty prevailed, yet I doubt not but the purer eye, when apprised of this error, will easily be undeceived, and as what is merely plausible will, when cammed, appear to be false, so apparent beau- ties, when rt founded in reason, will of course be deemed extravagant. Le Clerc's remarks on this passage are very judicious, and as they may serve to destroy a nation which, soon after our Athenian discoveries, about seventy years ago, was much 146 The Five Orders of Architecture too prevalent among us, and might, perhaps in some future hour of extravagance, prevail again, I shall, for the benefit of such as are unacquainted with the original, translate the whole passage. "In the most ancient monuments of this order," says he, "the columns are without bases, for which it is difficult to assign any satisfactory reason. Monsieur De Chambria, in his Parallel, is of the same opinion with Vitruvius, and maintains that the Doric column, being composed upon the model of a naked, strong and muscular man, resembling a Hercules, should have no base — pre- tending that the base to column is the same as a shoe to a man. But I must own, I cannot consider a column with- out a base in comparing it to a man, but I am, at the same time, struck with the idea of a person without feet rather than without shoes; for which reason I am inclinable to believe either that the architects of antiquity had not yet thought of employing bases to their columns, or that they omitted them in order to leave the pavement clear; the angles and projections of bases being stumbling blocks to passengers, and so much the more troublesome as the archi- tects of those times frequently placed their columns very near each other, so that had they been made with bases, the passages between them would have been extremely nar- row and inconvenient. And it was doubtless for the same reason that Vitruvius made the plinth of his Tuscan col- umn round, — that order, according to his construction, be- ing particularly adapted to servile and commercial purposes, where conveniency is preferable to beauty. However this be, persons of good taste will grant that a base not only gives a graceful turn to the column, but is likewise of real use, serving to keep it firm on its plan, and that if col- umns without bases are now set aside, it is a mark of the wisdom of our architects, rather than an indication of their The Five Orders of Architecture 147 *j&t*l&i *n>t&. ci&&t&6 . k ^St 3P" T ffri i nni , if i ^$ •ffiran^ f % ** >« * i 1 ■&r.';3 -5 1 i j ! Wt\ t i t til? JP-A t mUSUM. "j i in H ■■— ■ M % PLATE XXIX 148 The Five Orders of Architecture being governed by prejudice, as some adorers of antiquity would insinuate. In imitation of Palladio and all the modern architects, except Yignola, I have made use of the Attic base in this order, and it certainly is the most beautiful of any, though for variety's sake, when the- Doric and Ionic orders are employed together, the base invented by Vignola, of which a profile is annexed, may sometimes be used. Bernini has employed it in the colonnades of St. Peter's, and it has been successfully applied in many other buildings. The ancients sometimes made the shaft of the Doric col- umn prismatic, as appears by a passage in the fourth book of Vitruvius; and at other times they adorned it with a particular kind of shallow flutings, described from the centre of a square, no interval or fillet being left between them. Of this sort, there are now some columns to be seen in the temples of Paestum, near Naples, in different parts of Sicily, and in the church of St. Peter in Catenis, at Eome. The first of these manners has not, I believe, been imitated by any of the modern masters; nor is the second very fre- quent; Scamozzi blames it for its want of solidity; the projecting angles between the flutings being easily broken, and, if the material be soft, very subject to moulder. Vitruvius gives to the height of the Doric capital one module ; and all the moderns, except Alberti, have followed his example. Nevertheless, as it is of the same kind with the Tuscan, they should both bear nearly the same pro- portion to the heigbths of their respective columns, and consequently the Doric capital ought to be more than one module, which it accordingly is, both at the Coliseum and in the theatre of Marcellus, being, in the former of these buildings, upwards of thirty-eight minutes, and, in the latter, thirty-tbree minutes high. In the design here offered I have made the height of the The Five Orders of Architecture 149 whole capital thirty-two miniates, and in the form and dimensions of the particular members I have deviated but little from the profile of the theatre of Marcellus. The frieze, or neck, is enriched with husks and roses, as in Palladio's design, and as it has been executed by Sangallo, at the Farnese Palace in Eome, and by Cigoli, in the Cortile of the Strozzi at Florence, as well as in several buildings of note in this metropolis. The projection of these husks and flowers must not exceed that of the upper cincture of the column. The architrave is one module in height, and composed only of one fascia and a fillet, as at the theatre of Marcellus ; the drops are conical as they are in all the antiques ; not pyramidal, as they are improperly made by most of Amer- ican workmen; they are supposed to represent drops of water draining from the triglyph, and consequently they should be cones or parts of cones, not pyramids. The frieze and the cornice are each of them one module and a half in height; the metope is square, and enriched with a bull's skull, adorned with garlands of beads, in imitation of those on the temple of Jupiter Tonans, at the foot of the Capitol. In some antique fragments, and in a greater number of modern buildings, the metopes are alternately enriched with these ox-skulls, and with pateras, but they may be filled with any other ornaments of good forms, and frequently with greater propriety. Thus, in military structures, heads of Medusa, or of the Furies, thunderbolts, and other symbols of horror may be intro- duced; likewise helmets, daggers, garlands of laurel or oak, and crowns of various kinds — such as those used among the Eomans, and given as rewards for different mil- itary achievements ; but spears, swords, quivers, bows, cuirasses, shields and the like must be avoided, because the real dimensions of these things are too considerable to find 150 The Five Orders of Architecture admittance in such small compartments, and representa- tions in miniature always carry with them an idea of trivi- ality, carefully to be avoided in architecture as in all other parts. In sacred buildings, cherubs, chalices, and garlands of palm or olive may be employed; likewise doves, or other symbols of moral virtues. And in private houses crests or badges of dignity may sometimes be suffered, though sel- dom ; and indeed never, when they are of such stiff, insipid forms, as stars, garters, modern crowns, coronets, mitres, truncheons, and similar graceless objects, the ill effects of which may be seen at the Treasury, in St. James's Park, and in many other places. Too much variety in the ornaments of the metopes must be avoided lest the unity of the composition should be de- stroyed. It is best never to introduce more than two differ- ent representations, which should not consist of above one, or at most two objects each, of simple forms, and not over- charged with ornaments. In the disposition of these, care must be taken to place them with symmetry; those on the right, in correspondence with those on the left. Where- fore, when a triglyph happens to be in the middle of a front, it becomes necessary to couple the middle ones, by filling the two metopes on each side of the central triglyph with the same sort of ornaments, as is done at the gate of Burlington House, in Piccadilly, distributing the rest al- ternately throughout the composition as usual. It is like- wise to be observed that ornaments in metopes are not to project so much as they do at Bow church, or at General Wade's house in Burlington gardens, where, from their great relief, they are far more striking than the triglyphs, which ought to predominate, as being essential and prin- cipal parts in the composition. Palladio in his Basilica of Vicenza, has given to the most elevated parts of the ox- skulls and pateras, with which the metopes are filled, very The Five Orders of Architecture 151 little more projection than that of the triglyph; and in this he has copied the ancients, who seldom or never gave more projection to any ornament than that of the frame or border, in which it was enclosed: as appears by those inimitable fragments in the Villa Medici, and many others in different parts of Eome and elsewhere. The channels of the triglyph on their plan commonly form a right angle, but, to give them more effect, a narrow square groove may be cut in the inner angle, from top to bottom, and quite into the solid of the frieze. In the cornice I have deviated very little from my orig- inal. Le Clerc, who in his Doric profile has imitated that of Vignola, makes the mutules as broad as the capital of the triglyph; Mr. Gibbs has followed his example, and they have been executed in that manner on a couple of doors to houses on the north side of Lincoln's Inn Fields. But Vignola's method is preferable, who makes them no broader than the triglyph, as it is more sightly, and more conformable to the carpenter's art, in which the width of the rafter never exceeds the width of the beam or joint it stands upon. The ornaments of the soffit are nearly the same as those of Vignola : they should be entirely sunk up, wrought in the solid of the corona, and never drop down lower than its soffit. There is no necessity for cutting them deep; in most of Palladio's buildings they do not enter above two minutes into the corona, and that is quite sufficient. Vignola's other Doric profile is in imitation of that of the theatre of Marcellus; in it he has very judiciously pointed out, and in some measure corrected, the faults of the original; but reverence for the antique has made him rather too sparing of his amendments. I have given a design of this profile, with such further corrections as ap- peared necessary; the most considerable of them consisting 152 The Five Orders of Architecture in the enlargement of the dentils, which are neither in the antique model nor in Vignola's profile sufficiently conspic- uous to hold their due place in the composition. At the theatre of Marcellus the ornaments of the soffit are not in a horizontal position, but hang down towards the front of the corona, which, as it appears by Vitruvius, was a common practice among the ancients; and done to imitate the inclination of the rafters. Palladio and Vignola have both adopted this peculiarity, which D'Aviler supposes to have been first used in order to make the projection of the entablature appear more considerable. To me it has an exceedingly disagreeable appearance; the whole soffit seems in a falling state; and so far is it from producing the effect which D'Aviler supposes, that it actually makes, as it evidently must, the projection seem less than in reality it is. Vignola's two Doric entablatures, says D'Aviler, are both of them so elegantly composed, that it is scarcely possible to determine which of them ought to have the preference. The first, which is entirely antique is the lightest, and consequently properest for interior decora- tions, or objects intended for near inspection; the other composed by Vignola himself from various fragments of antiquity, being bolder and consisting of larger parts, seems better calculated for outside works and places where the point of view is either distant or unlimited. On polygonal plans, however, the mutule cornice must be avoided; because the soffits of the angular mutules would form irregular and very disagreeable figures; neither should it be employed in concaves of small dimensions for the same reason; nor in places where frequent breaks are requisite; it being extremely difficult, often impossible to prevent the mutules from penetrating and mutilating each other, in various unsightly manners. And wherever this The Five Or Jem of Architecture 153 PLATE XXS 154 The Five Orders of Architecture cornice is used on a convex surface, the sides of the mutules must be made parallel, for it would be both disagreeable and unnatural to see them broader, and consequently heavier in front than where they spring out of the mutule band. Palladio's Doric entablature is, likewise, very beautiful; I mean as it is executed in the Basilica of Vicenza, where it differs widely from the profile in his book, and is far preferable thereto. In the same plate with Yignola's den- til entablature there is a design of it, accurately copied from that building, which may serve as one instance of many to show how little the measures of his book are to be relied upon. Of all the entablatures, the Doric is most difficult to dis- tribute, on account of the large intervals between the centres of the triglyphs, which neither admit of increase or diminution, without injuring the symmetry and regular beauty of the composition. These constantly confine the composer of intercolumniations, divisible by two modules and a half; entirely exclude coupled columns, and produce spaces which, in general, are either too wide or too narrow for his purposes. To obviate these difficulties, the triglyphs, have often been omitted and the entablature made plain, as at the Coliseum in Eome, the colonnades of St. Peter's, of the Vatican, and in many other buildings, both at home and abroad. This, indeed, is an easy expedient; but while it robs the order of its principle characteristic distinction, leaves it poor, and very little superior to the Tuscan. The remedy seems desperate, and should never be employed but as a last resource. The ancients employed the Doric, in temples dedicated to Minerva, to Mars, and the Hercules, whose grave and manly dispositions suited well with the character of this The Five Orders of Architecture 155 order. Serlio says it is proper for churches dedicated to Jesus Christ, to St. Paul, St. Peter, or any other saints remarkable for their fortitude in exposing their lives and suffering for the Christian faith. Le Clerc recommends the use of it in all kinds of military buildings, as arsenals, gates of fortified places, guard-rooms, and similar struc- tures. It may likewise be employed in the houses of gen- erals, or other martial men; in mausoleums erected to their memory, or in triumphal bridges and arches built to celebrate their victories. I have made the height of the Doric column sixteen modules; which, in buildings where majesty or grandeur is required, is a proper proportion; but in others it may be somewhat more slender. Thus, Vitruvius makes the Doric column in porticoes higher by half a diameter than in temples; and most of the modern architects have, on some occasions, followed his example. In private houses, therefore, it may be 16 1/3, 16 1/2, 16 2/3 modules high; in interior decorations, even seventeen modules, and some- times perhaps a trifle more; which increase in the height may be added entirely to the shaft, as in the Tuscan order, without changing either the base or capital. The en- tablature, too, may remain unaltered in all the aforesaid cases; for it will be sufficiently bold without alteration. OF THE IONIC OEDEE. PLATES XVIII., XIX. AND XX. Among the ancients, the form of the Ionic profile ap- pears to have been more positively determined than that of any other order; for in all the antiques at Eome, the Temple of Concord excepted, it is exactly the same, and conformable to the description Vitruvius has given thereof. The modern artists have likewise been more unanimous in their opinions upon the subject; all of them, excepting Palladio and his imitators, having employed the dentil cornice, and the other parts of the profile, nearly as they are found in the Coliseum, the Temple of Fortune, and the Theatre of Marcellus. In Palladio's works we meet with three different Ionic entablatures, all of them very beautiful. The first is the true antique, which he has made use of at the palace of the Porti, and in several doors and windows of the Thiene, and Valmarana palaces, in Vicenza. The second is a very judicious imitation of the entablature in the Temple of Concord, and is executed by him in the upper arcade of the Basilica, in the same city. The third, which is an in- vention of his own, being the same with that in his book, he has employed, with some small difference, at the Chier- ieato Palace, at the Eotunda of Marchese Capra, and in various others of his buildings in the Vicentine, or at Venice. In the first plate of the Ionic order, there is a design of the antique profile collected by me from different an- tiquities at Eome. The height of the column is eighteen modules, and that of the entablature four modules and a 156 The Five Orders of Architecture 157 gZLuvfrSfirtu* 2$eue'8t'j!me/. PLATE mntr 158 The Five Orders of Architecture half, or one-quarter of the height of the column, as in the other orders, which is a trifle less than in any of the reg- ular antique Ionics. The base is Attic, as in all of the antiques, and the shaft of the column may either be plain or fluted, with twenty-four or with twenty flutings only, as at the Temple of Fortune, of which the plan should be a little more than semi-circular, as it is at the Temple of Jupiter Tonans, and at the Forum of Nerva, because then they are more distinctly marked. The fillet, or interval between the flutes, should not be broader than one-third of their width, nor narrower than one-quarter thereof. The ornaments of the capital are to correspond with the flutes of the shaft, and there must be an ove or a dart above the middle of each flute. The volutes, Plate XIX., are to be traced according to Goldman's method, which is the best. I have given a design of it, with an exact de- scription upon the plate. Perrault prefers Delorme's method of describing it, yet certainly it is not so perfect; for in Goldman's the circular portions that compose the volute have their radii at their junction, in the same straight line, so that they meet without forming an angle ; whereas, in that of Delorme, the radii never coincide, and, consequently, no two of the curves can join without form- ing an angle. The space in Delorme's volute between the first quadrants, in the first and second revolution, is of the same breadth throughout, both the quadrants being de- scribed from the same centre; but in Goldman's the space between the revolutions diminishes regularly from the very first. Moreover, Delorme has given no directions for describing the inner spiral, which determines the breadth of the fillet, and which, in his design, is nearly of the same breadth from first to last; but Goldman has taught the manner of describing it, so as to diminish gradually, with the same accuracy as the outward spiral. The Five Orders of Architecture 159 Palladio's volute, differing but little from that of Delorme, has nearly the same defects; and, though Mr. Gibbs has in some measure amended it, yet his likewise is faulty in the breadth of the fillet, which is equal through the greatest part of the first revolution. Vignola and Scamozzi, Serlio, Alberti, and others have, in their architraves, imitated those of the theatre of Mar- eellus, and of the Coliseum; having composed them of three fascias distinguished from each other only by small projections. This has but an indifferent effect ; the separa- tions so faintly marked are not sufficiently striking; and the architrave is left too destitute of ornaments for the rest of the profile : a defect most striking, whenever the moldings of the profile are enriched. On the other hand, Palladio's and Delorme's architraves appear too rich; being likewise composed of three fascias, separated by moldings. I have therefore, in this partic- ular, chosen to imitate the profile of the Temple of An- toninus and Faustina, where there are only two fascias, separated from each other by a molding. The three parts of the entablature bear the same propor- tion to each other in this as in the Tuscan order; the frieze is plain, as being most suitable to the simplicity of the rest of the composition; and the cornice is almost an exact copy from Vignola's design, in which there is a purity of form, a grandeur of style, and close conformity to the most approved antiques, not to be found in the pro- files of his competitors. If it be required to reduce this entablature to two-ninths of the height of the column (which, on most occasions, is a proportion preferable to that of one-quarter, particularly where the eye has been habituated to contemplate dimin- utive objects), it may easily be done, by making the module for the entablature less by one-ninth than the semi-diam- 160 The Five Orders of Architecture eter of the column; afterwards dividing it as usual, and observing the same dimensions as are figured in the design. The distribution of the dentil band will, in such case, answer pretty nearly in all the regular intercolumniations ; and in the outer angle there will be a dentil, as there is in the Temple of Fortune at Eome. In interior decorations, where much delicacy is required, the height of the entablature may be reduced even to one- fifth of the column, by observing the same method, and making the module only four-fifths of the semi-diameter. Of Palladio's profiles, that imitated from the Temple of Concord appears to me the best; its height is equal to one-fifth of the height of the column. The design which I have given of it is closely copied from the Basilica at Vicenza ; but it will be more perfect if the frieze be, made flat, and its height augmented so as to equal that of the architrave ; by which means, the proportion of the en- tablature to the column will be better; for the relation of one to five is, generally speaking, too small. In the cornice it will likewise be well to add, between the corona and fillet, under the cyma, an ogee of the same dimension with that over the modillions. Thus all the parts will be equally rich, and the upper cyma be better supported. This Scamozzi has done in his profile ; though, in other respects, his Ionic entablature may be considered as a copy from Palladio ; the fillet, being thus sustained by the ogee, may be diminished a trifle. Palladio's other profile I have copied from the Rotunda of Capra; its height is likewise one- fifth of the column. The frieze, as in the former design, is low and swelled ; but it will be better to raise it to the same height with the architrave, and keep it upright as before directed ; for the swell gives it a clumsy form, and, appearing a continuity of the same undulations which compose the architrave and The Five Orders of Architecture 161 *$£ -itfil&ixiUr. , . .^cft&H-fAM*- - - tgJBfaZ ar —4J&J* 162 The Five Orders of Architecture cornice, serves ta render the outline of the whole entabla- ture confused and much too abundant in curves. The frieze, when so formed, conveys the idea of a piece of timber used without being hewn, as was the practice of ruder times among the Greeks, and cannot with propriety be introduced in a. finished work. In the antique, there are few examples of these swelled friezes. Palladio probably took his hint from the Temple of Bacchus, near Eome, where the swelled frieze has been used in a Composite order; or, perhaps from the Basilica of Antoninus, where it has been employed in a Corinthian : with little success at the last, and with much less at the first, of these places ; for as the columns are there insulated, and the profile is marked at the four angles, the deform- ity becomes so much the more conspicuous ; and, notwith- standing Palladio's partiality to this form of frieze, which so frequently recurs in most of his works, it seldom or never can be introduced with success but on doors or windows, where the profile of the architrave is not marked under it; there, indeed, the swell forms a good contrast with the upright jambs, and has the further advantage of contracting the spread of the cornice which, in narrow intercolumniations, is very convenient; and, in most cases, may prevent the licentious practice of making the frieze and cornice no wider than the aperture of the door or window, and supporting them on each side with a sort of scroll, as at the Sorbonne in Paris, and at the Mansion House in this city. Palladio, in both of these profiles, has enriched the soffit of the corona with roses, which are here omitted, as in most cases they ought to lie. However, when the column is fluted, and the rest of the composition much adorned, they may and should he introduced, care being taken to proportion the panels, and other parts surrounding them, The Five Orders of Architecture 163 in the same manner as if the order were Corinthian or Composite. The antique Ionic capital differs from any of the others; its front and side faces are not alike. This particularity occasions great difficulty wherever there are breaks in the entablature, or where the decoration is continued in flank as well as in front; for either all the capitals in the flank must have the baluster side outward, or the angular cap- itals will have a different appearance from the rest, neither of which is admissible. The architect of the Temple of Fortune at Eome has fallen upon an expedient which, in some degree, remedies the defect. In that building the corner capitals have their angular volutes in an oblique position, inclining equally to the front and side, and offer- ing volute faces both ways. Wherever persons are violently attached to the antique, or furiously bent on rejecting all modern inventions however excellent, this is the only means to gratify them ; but when such is not the case, the angular capital invented by Scamozzi, or 'imitated and im- proved by him from the Temple of Concord, or borrowed from some modern compositions extant in his time, ought to be employed; for the distorted figure of the antique capital, with one volute straight and the other twisted, is very perceptible, and far from being pleasing to the eye. Annexed is a design of Scamozzi's capital, and another of a very beautiful one, executed in St. Peter's, of the Vatican ; probably composed by Michael Angelo. Similar capitals may also be seen in the church of the Koman Col- lege, and in various other buildings at Eome. In this order I have employed the Attic base. Of the antique base described by Vitruvius, and used by Vignola and Philibert Delorme in their Ionic orders, and by Sir Christopher Wren in some parts of St. Paul's, I think there is no example among the antiques; and being uni- 164 The Five Orders of Architecture versally esteemed a very imperfect production, I have not even given a design to it. As the Doric order is particularly affected in churches or temples dedicated to male saints, so the Ionic is prin- cipally used in such as are consecrated to females of matronal state. It is likewise employed in courts of jus- tice, in libraries, colleges, seminaries, and other structures having relation to arts or letters; in private houses and in palaces, to adorn the woman's apartments; and, says Le Clerc, in all places dedicated to peace and tranquillity. The ancients employed it in temples sacred to Juno, to Bacchus, to Diana, and other deities, whose dispositions held a medium between the severe and the effeminate. It is difficult, if not impossible, to agree with those who refer us to certain columns at Persepolis, as exhibiting the prototype of the Ionic capital ; since what is pointed out as resemblance strikes as antipathetic difference. As regards general form and character, there is not the very slightest similarity, whatever, between the supposed Persepolitan parent and the offspring attributed to it; still less is there any with respect to taste ; the former being as uncouth and unmeaning and capricious in its configuration, as the other is ben inteso, eumorphic and graceful. A formal and minute contrast between them would certainly be amus- ing, possibly instructive also ; but it must not be looked for here. Suffice it then to observe, that what are imagined to have been prototypic of the so-called Ionic capital are no more than four little bits of detail stuck upon the sides of an upright square member super-imposed upon a circular shaft and capital. The question then is, by what process of aesthetic alchemy came those comparatively insignifi- cant, certainly whimsical, adjuncts to be transmuted into the refined elegance of the Greek Ionic capital? The dis- tance between the hypothetically assumed original and the The Five Orders of Architecture 165 ^ra^twfr S&eUe'i#Tr^oitg' &. X^XyiM^H'. (Z^Lm'or&yb*/*! lu m 1 4 3k 5? $&*£&*& er€errrt0H&< 166 The Five Orders of Architecture fully developed Ionic capital is so great that there must have been very many intermediate stages of transition ere the metamorphosis was completed ; yet, not a single one of them can now be traced, or, at any rate, not one is pro- duced. Admitting, however, for the nonce, that the germ of the Voluted capital is to be plainly detected in the Persepolitan example, such fact is tantamount to irrefraga- ble proof that it is possible to seize upon a casual hint, however slight, or however rude, and shape out from it some untried, yet eminently successful form of the beautiful. It has sometimes been alleged as an imperfection in the Ionic or Voluted capital, that it is irregular in plan ; since, instead of presenting four faces, corresponding with those of the abacus, it has only two, whose flanks or ''baluster" sides, as they are termed, are altogether different in con- formation, both vertically and horizontally. Such is un- deniably the case ; vet, to say nothing of the variety of appearance so produced, what exquisite symphony of con- trasted curved lines ! The face of the Ionic capital, whether Asiatic or Attic, exhibits as charming a disposi- tion of flowing lines as can well be conceived; and com- pletely different as it is in form, the so-called "baluster" or pulvinated side of the capital contributes to the general expression of animated and graceful flexibility ; for, while its horizontal section shows concave curvature, its vertical section has a convex surface. The marked dissimilarity between the sides and the faces of the capital is by no means displeasing — most assuredly does not partake of capriciousness, the entire composition being admirably well motived, and thoroughly logical. We may suppose the problem to have been how to expand the capital hori- zontally in front, without, at the same time, enlarging the abacus, which had to be accommodated to the soffit of the The Fire Orders of Architecture 167 q^o^Lh&^.9Qp PLATE XXXIV 168 The Five Orders of Architecture architrave; and, never was difficult aesthetic problem solved more successfully. The lateral expansion of the face produces luxuriant fulness without heaviness; while the volutes are forcibly relieved by shadow — one of them by that which it casts upon the shaft of the column. One rather enviable peculiarity of the Ionic or Voluted capital is that it admits of being so shaped as to be per- fectly regular, and have four faces all alike, instead of only two. Such form of the capital does not, indeed, appear to have been adopted by the Greeks, but they showed with what facility it might be produced, when they occasionally turned the volute diagonally at the external angles of a portico, in order to obtain two similarly-shaped adjoining faces. It will, perhaps, then be said that though they had recourse to such treatment of the capital, as an expedient to accommodate it to that particular situation, they also rejected it, when not absolutely required for obviating what would have been an offensive irregularity, had the baluster side of a capital shown itself in the same range with the faces of other capitals on the return or flank of the building. Why the Greeks did not avail themselves of the felicitous invention they had hit upon, and carry it out much further, is rather surprising and difficult to be accounted for; at the same time, we ought, perhaps, to be grateful to them, jior having been content to indicate a new phase of the beautiful in the Voluted capital, leaving to those who came after them to apply it without scruple, as being of decidedly Greek origin. Existing and well authenticated examples of the antique, afford tolerably convincing proof that the Greeks allowed themselves considerable latitude in the treatment of the orders. So far from adhering to ready-cut and dry pro- portions and details, they sometimes ventured upon untried shapes of beauty, nothing less than shocking to The Five Orders of Architecture 169 orthodox Vitruvianists, and the adherents of Vignola, and other architectural arithmeticians. Of the Ionic, we have a most remarkable variety — un- deniabl}', too, of the best period of Greek art, in the attached columns within the temple of Apollo Epicurius at Bassas; than which nothing can be at once more awfully heterodox and more charmingly piquant. Not the capital alone, but the entire column, with its widely expanded base, and the very peculiar fluting or striating of the shaft, show consummate artistic study, and genuine artistic feeling. In the hands of the Eomans, and their modern Italian followers, the Voluted capital sadly degenerated. It com- pletely lost its former expression of flowing gracefulness combined with vivifying energy; and it was at length tamed into such feebleness and insipidity, that its original character was all but entirely effaced. The voluted them- selves were sometimes reduced to such utter insignificance as scarcely to manifest themselves ; so that from being one of the most plastic of those three classes, which we now call orders, that form of capital, quite lost all its original assthetic raciness of flavor. It is almost exclusively the prerogative of the Ionic capital, that it admits of most decided and strongly marked differences, not only as regards its general con- figuration and plan, but with respect to various particulars of detail. It can, for instance, either dispense with or admit of a necking, which may, again, be either plain or carved ; and in the latter case, it affords very great, almost unlimited, variety of ornamentation, so that there is no necessity for adhering to the precedent of the Greek "honeysuckle." Had the Voluted capital no other power of elasticity, than that of enlarging itself, at will, by the 170 The Five Orders of Architecture addition of a necking, even that alone would be a most enviable privilege; but in addition to those already indi- cated, it possesses several other elements of diversified expression and design. OF THE COEINTHIAN OEDEE. PLATES XXI AND XXII. The three columns in the Campo Vaccino, supposed re- mains of the Temple of Jupiter Stator, are generally allowed to be the most perfect models of the Corinthian order amongst the antiques at Eome. Palladio, in his fourth book, where he gives the whole profile at large, acknowledges that he never had seen any work better ex- ecuted, or more delicately finished ; that its parts are beautifully formed, well proportioned, and skilfully com- bined ; all which last qualities are certainly signified by his Benissimo iivtesi. "With these favorable sentiments, it is extraordinary that, in his design of the Corinthian order, he should so very considerably deviate from this excellent original, as scarcely to leave the smallest shadow of resemblance. Vignola, in his Corinthian profile, has chiefly imitated the above-mentioned fragment, and the interior order of, the Pantheon, another very perfect model. His composi- tion is uncommonly beautiful, and, without dispute, superior to that of any other master, he having artfully collected all the perfections of his originals, and formed a whole far preferable to either of them. The design which I have given differs but little from that of Vignola. The column is twenty modules high, and the entablature five; which proportions are a medium between those of the Pantheon and of the three columns. The base of the column may be either Attic or Corinthian ; both are beautiful. Palladio and Scamozzi have employed the Attic base enriched with astragals; but so frequent a 171 172 The Five Orders of Architecture repetition of the same semi-circular forms in junction has a very different effect, as may be observed at the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, at the Bank, and in various other buildings of this city, in which the profiles and forms of Palladio, good, bad, or indifferent, have indiscriminately been employed. If the entablature be enriched, the shaft of the column should be fluted, provided it be not composed of varie- gated marble ; for a diversity of colors renders even smooth surfaces confused, and ornaments of sculpture only serve to make the confusion greater. The nuttings may be filled to one-third of their height with cablings, as on the inside order of the Pantheon, which strengthen the lower part of the column, and make it less liable to damage. But when the columns are not within reach, nor subject to be hurt by passengers, the cables are better omitted, as the general hue of the shaft will then be the same throughout, and seem of a piece, which, when a part of the flute is filled and the other part left empty, is not the case, for the shaft then appears divided, and is less calculated to produce a great effect. In some very rich buildings the cablings are composed of reeds, husks, spiral-twisted ribands, flowers, and various other ornaments. At the Tuileries, in Paris, there are some Ionic columns exquisitely wrought in this manner, one of them by Jean Gougeon's own hand, and the rest under his immediate inspection. It is, however, far better to reserve such niceties for in- terior decorations. In exterior compositions, whatever doth not contribute to the forcible effect of the whole structure is, in a great measure, useless, sometimes even detrimental, and an expense which might more judiciously be employed where it would be more attentively considered. In general, it may be laid down as a maxim, that excessive The Five Orders of Architecture 173 <2l<sszmrs for windows. 185 flMMMMMP' 111 Iffl ill ji - 1 ■ I ES i I ■ I ^^8 = 1 ^1 B ill ll nil ll li* I 1111 mil— in 1 1 I | 1 1 i | I sft H 1 PLATE XXXVII 186 The Five Orders of Architecture employed in this order, being enriched with leaves of the acanthus, as all the antique capitals of this sort are. With regard to the method of tracing it, few directions will suffice, for the designs are exactly drawn and figured. The curvatures of the abacus are described from the summits of equilateral triangles; the projection of the volutes is determined by a line drawn from the extremity of the astragal to the extremity of a horn of the abacus; and the projection of the leaves is determined by another line drawn parallel to that from the fillet, under the astragal. The manner of executing both these and all other en- riched capitals here is, generally speaking, bad. I do not, however, mean to accuse our workmen of incapacity ; many of them are excellent, and in neatness of execution out-do, perhaps, those of any other country; but, sometimes from the parsimony of their employers, and in some degree, perhaps, for want of thorough skill and facility in design, their performances are often insipid without intention or effect, and by no means expressive either of the taste or intelligence of the performer. Many even of our greatest architects have too much neglected the detail, having employed their attention wholly on the general disposition of their composition. This neglect, though authorized by great examples, ought by no means to be imitated. It is the business of the architect to attend to the minutest objects, as well as to the most considerable. If the entire execution of the fabric be left to his direction, the faults that are committed will, of course, be stated to his account, and therefore it will be prudent in him to select the ablest workmen, and to furnish them with proper models and precise instructions, in which he will show the entent of his capacity, and dis- tinguish himself from the common herd of those who, without due qualifications, assume the title of architects. The most masterly disposition, incorrectly executed, can The Five Orders of Architecture 187 only be considered as a sketch in painting, or as an ex- cellent piece of music miserably murdered by village fiddlers, equally destitute of taste and powers of execution. Care must be taken in Composite as well as in Corinthian capitals, that the feet of the lower leaves do not project beyond the upper part of the shaft of the column, as at St. Carlo in the Corso at Eome, and at the Banqueting- house in London ; for nothing can be uglier. Neither are these leaves as they mount to bend forwards, as in many of the antiques, and in some modern buildings, because they then hide a considerable part of the upper row of leaves, and give a stunted disagreeable form to the whole capital. The different divisions of the acanthus leaf, and bunches of olive or parsley which compose the total of each leaf, must be firmly marked, and massed in a very distinct manner; the stems that spring from between the upper leaves are to be kept low upon the vase of the capital while rising between the leaves, then spring gradually forwards, to form the different volutes; and the ornaments, which sometimes are used, to adorn the sides of the angular volutes, are never to project beyond the fillets between which they are confined. These are all the directions that well can be given in writing, but those who would excel in ornamental works of this kind or any other, must con- sult the foliages and flowers of nature, the buildings, an- cient or modern, in which they have been executed with care and judgment. The Ionic, Composite and Corinthian capitals to be seen in various parts of Somerset Place, were copied from models executed under my direction at Eome, and imitated, both in point of forms and manner of workmanship, from the choicest antique originals. They may serve as guides to such as have no opportunity of ex- amining the buildings from which these models were collected. 188 The Five Orders of Architecture The parts of the entablature bear the same proportion to each other as in the Ionic and Tuscan orders. The architrave is nearly of the same form with those of Palladio and Vignola, and that of the Basilica of Antoninus. The frieze is enriched with foliages, in imitation of those on the frieze of Nero's frontispiece, of which the most promi- nent parts should never project more than doth the upper- most molding of the architrave under them. The cornice is imitated from Scamozzi, and differs from the Corinthian only in the modillions, which are square, and composed of two fascias. The soffit of the intervals between the dentils must be hollowed upwards behind the little fillet in front, as they are in most of the antiques, which occasions a dark shade that marks the dentil more distinctly ; and the same method must be observed in the Ionic and Corinthian orders, for the same reason. The roses in the soffit of) the corona are not to project beyond its horizontal surface, and care must be taken not to vary them so much as at St. Peter's of the Vatican, because the unity of the composition suffers thereby; the modillions or dentils might, with almost as much propriety, be varied, it will be proper, therefore, in small composition, to make them all alike, as they are in most of the antiques; that so they may not strike nor occupy the attention of the beholder as objects for distinct contemplation, but as parts of one great whole. In larger compositions, they may be of two kinds, but similar in outline and dimension, which occasions more variety, yet without confusion; for then the images succeed each other so rapidly, and are from their similitude, so instantaneously comprehended, that the third impression takes place before the first is in any degree obliterated; so that nearly the same effect is pro- duced as by a continued succession of the same object. But though this variety be practised, and is to a certain The Five Orders of Architecture 189 degree allowable, in small objects which the eye peruses at a glance, or in such as, being merely accessory, may or may not be introduced, and do not affect the general out- line or bent of the composition, yet it is by no means to be tolerated in columns and other principal or essential parts, which, from the number of their constituent points, are not conveyed to the mind at once, either with ease or perfect clearness, and therefore, if varied, cannot fail of exciting confused ideas. In the fourth book of Palladio we find, among other ancient temples one, of which the portico consists of four Corinthian columns and two pilasters. The pilasters are fluted in a perpendicular direction ; two of the columns are fluted spirally, and the other two have the shafts covered with laurel leaves — a variety absurd as unpleasing, which totally destroys the general effect of the composition, and conveys no idea but that of a structure made up of dis- cordant fragments, as they happened to come in the build- er's way. The Eomans used the Composite order more frequently in their triumphal arches than in any other buildings; meaning, as Serlio supposes, to express their dominion over those nations that invented the orders of which this is composed. It may, says Le Clerc, be used with pro- priety wherever elegance and magnificence are to be united, but it is more particularly adapted to buildings designed to commemorate signal events, or celebrate the virtues and achievements of conquerors and legislators, because the capitals and other ornaments may be composed of emblems and of elusive representations agreeable to the custom of the ancients, as appears by very many fragments of capitals and other members of architecture scattered about in dif- ferent parts of Borne and elsewhere. Some of these are represented in the second plate of the Composite order, 190 The Five Orders of Architecture and more may be found in the works of Montano, Le Clerc, Piranesi, and others, of whose works the reader will find a catalogue in the ABECEDAEIO pittorico. The Composite entablature may be reduced to two-ninths of the column, which, to avoid fractions, I shall call four modules and a half, by making the module only nine-tenths of the semi-diameter, and observing the same measures as are figured in the design, and there then will be a dentil in the outward angle, as in the Ionic order. It may likewise, if required, be reduced to one-fifth, by making the module four-fifths of the semi-diameter; though, in cases where it may be necessary to diminish so much, it will always be better to employ the Ionic cornice, which, being composed of fewer parts, will still retain an air of grandeur, not- withstanding the smallness of the general mass. Most authors give to the Composite order the last place, as being last invented, and a compound which, of course, ought to be preceded by all the simples. I have, however, followed Scamozzi's arrangement, his appearing to me the most natural; for his orders succeed each other according to their degree of strength, and in the progression that must absolutely be observed whenever they are to be em- ployed together. OF PILASTEES. PLATE XXV. Pilasters are, I believe, a Roman invention, and certainly an improvement. The Greeks employed antse in their temples, to receive the architraves where they entered upon the walls of the cell. These, though they were in one di- rection of equal diameter with the columns of the front, were in flank extravagantly thin in proportion to their height, and neither their bases nor capitals bore any re- semblance to those of the columns they accompanied. The Eoman artists, disgusted, probably, with the meagre aspect of these antse, and the want of accord in their bases and capitals, substituted pilasters in their places, which, being proportioned and decorated in the same manner with the columns, are certainly more seemly, and preserve the unity of the composition much better. Pilasters differ from columns in their plan only, which is square, as that of the column is round. Their bases, capitals, and entablatures have the same parts, with all the same heights and projections, as those of columns, and they are distinguished in the same manner by the names of Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Composite- and Corinthian. Of the two the column is, doubtless, mosl perfect. Never- theless, there are occasions in which pilasters may be em- ployed with great propriety; and some where they are, on various accounts, even preferable to columns. Engaged pilasters are employed in churches, galleries, halls, and other interior decorations, to save room for as they seldom project beyond the solid of the walls more than 191 192 The Five Orders of Architecture one-quarter of their diameter, they do not occupy near so much space even as engaged columns. They are likewise employed in exterior decorations ; sometimes alone, in- stead of columns on account of their being less expensive. They may likewise be employed instead of columns, de- tached, to form peristyles and porticoes, but there is no instance of this, that I remember, in all the remains of antiquity; neither has any modern architect, I believe, been so destitute of taste as to put it in practice. When pilasters are used alone, as principal in the com- position, they should project one-quarter of their diameter beyond the walls, as Scamozzi teaches. Mutilations are, on all occasions, studiously to be avoided, as being destructive of perfection, and strong indications either of inattention or ignorance in the composer. When pilasters are placed behind columns, and very near them, they need not project above one-eight of their dia- meter, or even less, excepting there should be imposts or continued cornices in the inter-pilaster ; in which case what has been said above must be attended to. But if they be far behind the columns, as in porticoes, porches, and peri- styles, they should project one-sixth of their diameter at least; and when they are on a line with the columns, their projection is to be regulated by that of the columns, and consequently it never can be less than a semi-diameter, even when the columns are engaged as much as possible. This extraordinary projection, however, will occasion no very great deformity, as the largest apparent breadth of the pilaster will exceed the least only in the ratio of eleven to ten, or thereabouts. But if columns be detached, the angular pilaster should always be coupled with a column, to hide its inner flank. It is sometimes customary to execute pilasters without any diminution ; in the antiques there are several instances The Five Orders of Architecture 193 f 166 Tunic Ctdunm — Base and Proportions of 60. 70 Ionic Order 156-170 Ionic Order — I higin of 57. 58 Ionic Temple 68-72 M Modillion Cornice 176-178 Orders of Architecture — Fabled origin of 55-59 Orders of Architecture — General description of 104-120 Index in Orders above Orders 218-220 Origin of Building 21-23 Origin of the Column 42-4 5 Origin of the Doric Order 56, 57 Origin of Grecian Architecture 4G--I8 Origin of the Five Orders 105 Ornaments 98,103 P Parthenon at Athens 85-87 Parthenon — Columns of 05, 66 Pedestals -218-211 Pedestals for the Orders 133 Pediments 165-221-224 Persians and Caryatides 135. 107-203 Phoenician Architecture 27, 28 Piers — Designs for 177 Pilasters 191-106 Pilaster Capitals 133 Plate I — Progress of Building 23 Plate II— Parthenon at Athens 58 Plate III— ITexa style Temple 62 Plate IV— Temple of Apollo 64 Plate V— Ionic Temple 68 Plate VI— Ionic Temple 72 Plate VII— Temple of Minerva 7 * Plate VIII— Temple of Polias 78 Plate TX— Temple of Erect heus 80 Plate ^* — Chora gic Monument 82 Plate "-'T — Temple of Jupiter — Athens 86 Plate XII— Window— Temple of Minerva 90 Plate XIII— Regular Moldings 96 Plate XIV— The Five Orders 100 Plate XV— Tuscan Order 106 Plate XVT— Doric Order 108 Plate XVII— Doric Entablatures 110 Plate XVIII— Ionic Order 112 Plate XIX— Goldman's Volute 116 Plate XX— Ionic Entablatures 118 Plate XXI— Corinthian Order 122 Plate XXII— Corinthian Order from Temple of Jupiter 124 IV Index Plate XXIII — Roman, or Composite. Order 126 Plate XXV— Composite Entablatures 128 Plate XXVI — Persians and Caryatides 1.15 Plate XXVII — Intercolumniations 137 Plate XXX— Types of Arcades in:! Plate XXXI — Columns upon Columns 157 Plate XXXTI— Arches upon Arches 101 Plate XXXTH — Pediments and Imposts 165 Plate XXXIV— Balusters, etc 167 Plate XXXVr— Designs for Gates and Piers 177 Plate XXXVIIJ— Designs for Windows 185 Plate XXXIX— Windows 30 r. Proportions of the Orders 114-117 R I tegular Moldings 90 Roman Architecture 32-.':7 Roman, or Composite Order 126 S Specimens of Ancient Sculpture 75-81 T Temple of Apollo 64, 87, 88 Temple of Bacchus lfi'J Temple of Erectheus HO Temple of Juno 60 Temple of Jupiter— Athens fio. 80-80 Temple of Minerva 74, 88. 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