ARCHITECTURE. 
used as coverings to their sacred buildings, 
till Caesar obtained leave to cover his house 
with a pointed roof, after the manner of 
temples. In Grecian antiquity we meet 
only with triangular pediments, and in Ro- 
man buildings we meet with both the tri- 
angular and circular. In rows of openings, 
or niches, both kinds of pediments were 
employed in the same range, and disposed 
in alternate succession. The horizontal 
cornices of pediments should never be dis- 
continued, as may be seen in many of the 
street houses of London, in order to give 
room for a fan light, and to lessen the ex- 
penses of the frontispiece, by introducing 
shorter columns and a less massy entabla- 
ture : for since the horizontal cornice repre- 
sents the tie-beam, and the inclined ones the 
rafters, the columns will appear to have a 
tottering effect by spreading them out at 
the top beyond the extremities of their 
bases. 
Vitruvius observes, that the Greeks never 
used mutules, modillions, or dentils, in the 
front, in which the end of the roof, or fasti- 
gium, appears, because that the ends of the 
rafters and the ends of the laths which sup- 
port the tiles only appear at the eaves of 
the building. Now, as mutules and dentils 
originated from the projecting ends of the 
rafters and laths, following the course of na- 
ture, it would have been absurd to intro- 
duce them into the pediment. 
However just this reasoning appears, we 
find from the remains of Grecian antiquity 
this assertion only verified in the inclined 
cornices of the pediment : for mutules are 
constantly employed in the horizontal cor- 
nice ; but neither mutules, modillions, nor 
dentils, on the sloping sides : at least, when 
any of the edifices in Greece appear with 
those innovations, they were introduced 
during the time it was a province of the 
Roman empire. Of this practice at Rome 
the Pantheon and the frontispiece of Nero 
are examples of modillions ; and the temple 
of Fortune one where dentils are used. In 
the inclined cornices of pediments the sides 
of the modillions and dentils are planes per- 
pendicular to the horizon and to the front of 
the edifice ; and in the same vertical planes 
with those of the modillions or dentils of 
the horizontal cornice. 
Balustrades. A balustrade is a range of 
small columns, called balusters, supporting 
a cornice, used as a parapet or as a screen 
to conceal the whole or a part of the roof : 
it is also sometimes used as a decoration for 
terminating the building. Balustrades are 
employed in parapets, on the margins of 
stairs, or before windows, or to inclose ter- 
races or other elevated places of resort, or 
on the sides of the passage way of bridges. 
It is remarkable, that there are no remains 
of balusters to be seen in any ancient build- 
ing. In the theatres and amphitheatres of 
the Romans the pedestals of the upper or- 
ders were always continued through the 
arcades, to serve as a parapet for the spec- 
tators to lean over. The lowermost seats 
next to the arena in the amphitheatres, and 
those next to the orchestra in the theatres, 
were guarded by a parapet or podium. The 
walls of ancient buildings generally termi- 
nated with the cornice itself, or with a 
blocking course, or with an Attic. In the 
monument of Lysicrates at Athens, which is 
a small beautiful building, the top is finished 
with fynials, composed of honeysuckles, 
solid behind, and open between each pair 
of fynials : each plant or fynial is bordered 
with a curved head, and the bottom of each 
interval with an inverted curve. Perhaps 
terminations of this nature might have been 
employed in many other Grecian buildings, 
as some coins seem to indicate ; but this is 
the only existing example of the kind. The 
temples in Greece are mostly finished with 
the cornice itself. This was also the case 
with many of the Roman temples ; but as 
there are no remains of balustrades in an- 
cient buildings, their antiquity may be 
doubted : they are, however, represented in 
the works of the earliest Italian writers, 
who perhaps may have seen them in the 
ruins of Roman edifices. When a balustrade 
finishes a building, and crowns an order, its 
height should be proportioned to the archi- 
tecture it accompanies, making it never 
more than four-fifths, nor less than two- 
thirds of the height of the order, without 
reckoning the zocholo, or plinth, on which 
it is raised, as the balustrade itself should be 
completely seen at a proper point of view. 
Balustrades that are designed for use should 
always be of the height of parapet walls, 
as they answer the same purpose, being 
nothing else than an ornamental parapet. 
This height should not exceed three feet 
and a half, nor be less than three feet. In 
tlie balusters, the plinth of the base, the 
most prominent part of the swell, and the 
abacus of their capital, are generally in the 
same straight line : their distance should not 
exceed half the breadth of the abacus or 
plinths, nor be less than one-third of this 
measure. On stairs or inclined planes the 
same proportions are to be observed as on 
