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2633. We are not of the opinion of Sir William Chambers in respect of the arcades which Vignola has given; that author had not, we think, critically examined their composition, and we confess we do not think his own examples are improvements on those of the master in question; but we are willing to admit that in the examples of arcades with pedestals, they would have been much improved by assigning a greater height generally to the plinths of the pedestals, which are, doubtless, much too low, and might be well augmented by adding to them a portion of the dies of the pedestals.

2634. Great as is our admiration of Palladio, we do not think it necessary to say more relative to his arcades, than that he has given only designs of arches with pedestals, and that their height is from one and two thirds to two and a half of their width. His piers are generally 3 modules, except in the Composite order, wherein they are 4 modules. 2635. Scamozzi makes his Tuscan arch a little less than double its width, increasing the height gradually to the Corinthian arch with pedestals to nearly twice and a half the width. He diminishes his piers as the delicacy of the order increases, his Corinthian piers being only 3 modules in width. We do not, however, think it necessary to dwell longer on this part of the subject, and shall close it by observing that the impost of the arch should not much vary from half a module in height, and that the width of the archivolt, which should touch the shaft of the column or pilaster in the geometrical elevation, at its springing, is necessarily prescribed by the width of pier left after setting out the column upon it. Where columns are used on piers, their projection must be such that the most prominent member of the impost should be in a line with the axis of the column on the transverse section. In Ionic, Composite, and Corinthian arcades, however, it may project a little beyond the axis of the columns, to avoid the disagreeable mutilations which are otherwise rendered necessary in the capitals. Arcades should project not less than their width from the front of the wall which backs them." With regard to their interior decoration," says Chambers, "the portico may either have a flat ceiling or be arched in various manners. Where the ceiling is flat, there may be on the backs of the piers, pilasters of the same kind and dimensions with the columns on their fronts; facing which pilasters there must be others like them on the back wall of the portico. Their projection as well as that of those against the back of the piers may be from one sixth to one quarter of their diameter. These pilasters may support a continued entablature, or one interrupted and running across the portico over every two pilasters to form coffers; or the architrave and frieze only may be continued, while the cornice alone is carried across the portico over the pilasters as before, and serves to form compartments in the ceiling, as is done in the vestibule of the Massini palace at Rome, and in the great stable of the King's mews, near Charing Cross," no longer in existence, having been destroyed to make way on its site for the execrable mass of absurdity to which the government who sanctioned it have facetiously

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given the name of National Gallery. Chambers thus continues: -"Where the portico is arched, either with a semi-circular or elliptical vault, the backs of the piers and the inner wall of the portico may be decorated with pilasters, as is above described, supporting a regular continued entablature, from a little above which the arch should take its spring, that no part of it may be hid by the projection of the cornice. The vault may be enriched with compartments of various regular figures, such as hexagons, octagons, squares, and the like, of which, and their decorations, several examples are given among the designs for ceilings." Of these we shall hereafter give figures in the proper place. "But when the vault is groined, or composed of flats, circular or domical coves, sustained on pendentives, the pilasters may be as broad as are the columns in front of the piers, but they must rise no higher than the top of the impost, the mouldings of which must finish and serve them instead of a capital, from whence the groins and pendentives are to spring, as also the bands or arcs-doubleaux which divide the vault."

2636. In the examples of arcades, we have followed those given by Chambers, as exhibiting a variety which may be instructive to the student, and at the same time afford hints for other combinations. Fig. 908. is one of the compositions of Serlio, and is ar

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expedient for arching in cases where columns have been provided, as in places where the use of old ones may be imposed on the architect. The larger aperture may be from 4 to 5 diameters of the column in width, and in height double that dimension. smaller opening is not to exceed two thirds of the larger one, its height being determined by that of the columns. Chambers thinks, and we agree with him, that this sort of disposition might be considerably improved by adding an architrave cornice or an entablature to the column, by omitting the rustics and by surrounding the arches with archivolts. It is not to be inferred, because this example is given, that it is inserted as one to be followed except under very peculiar circumstances. Where an arrangement of this kind is adopted, care must be used to secure the angles by artificial means.

2637. Fig. 909. is given from the cortile of the castle at Caprarola by Vignola, a structure which in the First Book of this work we have (346.) already mentioned. The height of the arches is somewhat more than twice their width. From the under side of the arch to the top of the cornice is one third of the height of the arch, the breadth of whose pier is equal to that of the arch, and the aperture in the pier about one third of its breadth.

2638. A composition of Bramante, executed in the garden of the Belvedere at Rome, is given at fig. 910. The arch in height is somewhat more than twice its width, and the

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breadth of the pier equal to the opening. By dividing the latter into have a measure which seems to have prevailed in the mind of the archite two of them will measure the parts of the pier supporting the archivolts, for the two columns, two for the intervals between the niche and the colum the niche. Half the diameter of the arch measures the height of the pedest are of the height of ten diameters, and their entablature one quarter of the columns. The impost and archivolt are each equal to half a diameter of th 2639. Fig. 911. is an example whose employment is not uncommon in Palladio, and was considered by our great countryman Inigo Jones to b imitation. The arch may be taken at about twice its width, and the pi one nor more than two thirds of the width of the aperture.

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2640. The example in fig. 912. is from the hand of Vignola, and was e of the Borghese family at Mondragone, near Frascati. In it the arch in height than twice its width, and the breadth of the pier columns supp includes a little less than the width of the arch itself. We are not quite sa here produced it as an example, though, compared with the following of know whether we should not on some accounts prefer it.

2641. The last example (fig. 913.) is one by that great master, Palladio, at Vicenza. From the figure it is impossible to judge of its beauty in ex can any imitation of it, unless under circumstances in every respect simi! sensation with which the building itself acts on the spectator; yet in the fi meagre and nothing worth. We can therefore easily account for the conduct they are called, who, never having seen this master's works, indulge in ignor of the pictorial effects which his compositions produce. Though not e with Chambers in his concluding observations on arcades and arches, transfer them to these pages. "The most beautiful proportion," he obse positions of this kind is, that the aperture of the arch be in height twice the breadth of the pier do not exceed that of the arch, nor be much less order be in height two thirds of the large columns, which height being di parts, eight of them must be for the height of the column, and the ninth the architrave cornice, two fifths of which should be for the architrave an cornice. The breadth of the archivolt should be equal to the superior small columns, and the keystone at its bottom must never exceed the same

SECT. XI.

ORDERS ABOVE ORDERS.

2642. Vitruvius, in the fifth chapter of his book "On the Forum and ] which species of buildings it is well known that orders above orders were instructs his readers: -"The upper columns are to be made one fourth below" (quarta parte minores quam inferiores sunt constituenda)," and that b being loaded with a weight, ought to be the stronger; because, also, we s practice of nature, which in straight-growing trees, like the fir, cypress, the thickness at the root greater than it is at top, and preserves a gra throughout their height. Thus, following the example of nature, it is righ bodies which are uppermost should be less than those below, both in resp thickness." It is curious that the law thus given produces an exactly simi

laid down by Scainozzi, p. 2. lib. v. cap. ii., whereon we shall have more presently to speak. Galliani, Chambers, and others have considered the above-quoted passage of Vitruvius in connection with another in chap. vii. of the same book, which treats of the portico and other parts of the theatre, wherein the author states, after giving several to this question unimportant details," The columns on this pedestal" (that of the upper order) "are one fourth less in height" (quartâ parte minores altitudine sint) "than the lower columns." The reader will here observe the word altitudine is introduced, which does not appear in the passage first quoted; and we beg him, moreover, to recollect that the last quotation relates entirely to the scene of the ancient theatre, in which liberties were then taken with strict architectural proportion as much as they are in these later days. Those who think that because Vitruvius interlarded his work with a few fables, he is therefore an author not worth consulting, as ephemeral critics have done in respect of that great master of the art, Palladio, may opine we have wasted time in this discussion; but, adopting the old maxim of Horace, "Non ego paucis offendar maculis," we shall leave them to the exposure which, with the instructed architect, their own ignorance will ultimately inflict on them, and to the enjoyment of the felicity attendant on a slight knowledge of the subject a person is in the habit of handling.

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2643. We will now place before the student our own reading and explanation of the passage of Vitruvius relative to the use of orders above orders, and attempt to show what we conceive to be its real meaning. In fig. 914. the diagram exhibits an Ionic placed above a Doric column: the entablature (which however does not belong to the consideration) being in both cases one fourth of the height of the column. Inasmuch as in our previous rules (following Vignola) it will be recollected that the module of the Doric order is subdivided into twelve, whilst that of the Ionic is subdivided into eighteen parts, we must, for the purpose of obtaining an uniformity of measures in both orders, reduce those of either to the other to obtain similar dimensions. Instead, therefore, of measuring the upper order by itself, which would not afford the comparison sought, we shall have to reduce its established measures to those of the lower one, or Doric, and this, as well as the measurement of the lower order itself, is taken in modules and decimal parts of its semidiameter. Thus, the lower order being 2 modules at its bottom diameter and 1.666 modules at its upper diameter, the mean, without descending to extreme mathematical nicety, may be taken at 1-833, which multiplied by the height, 18 modules 32.994, the area of a section through the centre of the column. Now if the upper columns are to be the same thickness at the bottom as the lower ones are at the top, that is, 1 666 module of the lower order, their upper diameters will be 1.387 (that is, five sixths of the lower diameter), and the mean will be 1.526, which, multiplied by 16, the height, 24-416 the area of a section down the centre of the column, and just one fourth less than that of the lower column. The investigation tends to show us that we should not lightly treat the laws laid down by Vitruvius and his followers at the revival of the arts, for we may be assured that in most cases they are not empirical, but founded on proper principles. We cannot, however, leave this point without giving another reason, which is conclusive against Chambers's construction of the passage; it is, that supposing the upper column's lower Fig. 914. diameter to be the same or nearly so as the lower column's upper diameter, if the fourth part had relation to the height instead of the bulk, we should have had the absurdity in the illustration above given, of an Ionic column in the second order only six and three quarters diameters high, whilst the lower or Doric is nine diameters in height. 2644. Scamozzi, we doubt not, thought as we have expressed ourselves on this subject, and we here translate the words he uses in the eleventh chapter of his sixth book (second part). "Hence it is more satisfactory, and they succeed better and are more pleasing to the eye, when these columns (the upper ones) are made according to their proper diminution, so that the lower part of the upper column may be just the thickness of the upper part of the lower one, and so from one to the other, as may be seen in the Ionic order of the Theatre of Marcellus and other edifices; and this is the reason and natural cause that it is the same as though out of a long and single tree the shafts were cut out one after the other."

2645. The laws of solidity seem to require that where more than one order is used, the strongest is to occupy the lower situation; thus the Doric is placed on the Tuscan, the Ionic on the Doric, the Corinthian on the Ionic, and the Composite on the Corinthian; though, with respect to the last, we find examples of importance wherein the reverse has been the case. Two tiers of columns should not be of the same order, neither should an intermediate order be omitted; such, for instance, as placing the Ionic on the Tuscan column, or the Corinthian on the Doric; for by this practice many irregularities are introduced, especially in the details of the members.

2646. Frontwise the axes of the upper and lower columns must be in the same vertical plane, but viewed in flank this is not absolutely necessary; they should not, however, deviate too much from it. In the theatre of Marcellus the axes of the upper columns are nearly a foot within those of the Doric below them; but circumstances required this, and there is no great objection to the practice if the solidity of the structure be not lessened by it. Chambers observes that the retraction should never be greater than at the theatre of Marcellus, where the front of the plinth in the second order is in a line with the top of the shaft in the first. When the columns are detached, they should be placed centrally over each other, so that the axes of the upper and under ones may form one continued line, by which means solidity is gained as well as a satisfactory result to the eye. As to the false bearings of the bases of the upper order on the profile, this is a matter neither really affecting stability nor the appearance of the design.

2647. In England there are not many examples of orders above orders, while on the Continent the practice has not been uncommon; but it is always a matter of great difficulty so to arrange them as to avoid irregularities where triglyphs and modillions in the same design meet in the composition. We have used the figures of Chambers for our illustration here, because they are nearly coincident with the rules of Vitruvius and Scamozzi, and we shall now place them before the reader, observing that the irregularities alluded to are almost altogether avoided.

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2648. Fig. 915. exhibits the Doric over the Tuscan order. The intervals A, B, and C are respectively 21, 4, and 6} modules; and A', B', and C′, 3, 5, and 8 modules of their order. The entablature of the lower order is 3 modules, the column, including base and capital, being 14 modules high; and the entablature of the upper order is 4 modules high, the column with its base and capital being 16 modules in height.

2649. The distribution of the Doric and Ionic orders is given in fig. 916., wherein the intervals A, B, and C are respectively 3, 5, and 8 modules; D, 7 module; and A', B', C', and D' respectively 4, 7, 10, and 14 modules. The Doric order in this example is 20 modules high, whereof 4 are assigned to the entablature; the Ionic 22 modules high, whereof 4 belong to the entablature.

2650. In fig. 917. is represented the Corinthian above the Ionic order; the intervals A, B, C, D are respectively 5, 6, 7, and 1 modules, and those of A', B', C' D' respectively 6.4, 76, 88, 16 modules; the lower order is 22 modules high, 18 being given to the column with its base and capital; and the upper or Corinthian order is 24 modules high, whereof 20 belong to the height of the column, including its base and capital.

2651. The last (fig. 918.) is of the Corinthian order above and Composite below. In the lower order the intervals A, B, C, D are 43, 6, 7, and 1 modules respectively, and A', B', C', and D', in the upper order, 6, 76, 8.8, and 1.6 modules respectively. The whole height of the Corinthian order is 25 modules, whereof 5 are given to the entablature; the Composite order here is 24 modules, of which 20 belong to the column, including the base and capital.

2652. We insert the observations of Chambers relative to the above four figures, which,

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