Account of Architects
130
Moreover, to the bodies or Shafts of some Columins appertain
Striges, which (not to infist upon whar the Learned Vossus and other Gri¬Striges. -
tis have contended) are those excavated Chanmell, by our Workmen calfd
Flarines and Groeves: These are particularly affested to the lonic Order (rarehy
the Doric) uti solarum ruge in imitation of the Plaits of Womens Robes, as our
Maser resembles them; and some of thele Chamnells we find to go vinding a.
hout Pilles, &c. but it is not approved. Between these are the Stria, we ma)
Stria.
properly English them Raies or Beames, which being twenty (or as some 24.) in
numberare those plain spaces berween the Flatings in the lonic, Doric Corinbian
and Compoled Orders; which tbrelast have (vich some smal difference) borrow -
d this Ornament from the lonic. And in some of those (as in that Dickesian
Doric Example) they are so made, as to reduce the Rays to a sharp edg only,
by their contiguity without any spaces at all. But sometimes we find the
Striges to be fill d up with a swelling, a third part from the Base, and these we
for so I think fit to interpret the French
may call Stav'd, or Cabl'd-Columns;
Thus we find some Corinthian Pillars often
Embastone, and Alberti s Rudens.
treated; the Stria being commonly a third or fourth part of the widnes of
the Flatings, and diminishing with the Contraction of the Scapus, unles the Shaft
be very high, in which case the distance does it without the ayd of the Workman; -
sometimes also we have seen them totally filled. We should now come
to the Entablature, but a word of
Pillasters, call'd in Greek Parastatae, and by the Ialians Membretti, for Modul
Parasata
and Ornament observe their entire Columns if they stand alone; but so they
do not for their prominencie, which being to gain room, reduces them some.
times to the square, whereof the narrower side is frequently applied to Walls,
by which alone some will only have them to differ from Pillars themselves;
but that ought to be understood of such as have no Imposts and Arches, upon
which occasions the Ligbts they let in do much govern their proportions, as
Palladio has judiciously shew'd in l. 1. c. 13. &c. Likewise, where they happen
to be at Angles, and according to the surcharg d weight; and therefore a
Rustic superficies, (as Sir H. Wotton has discreetly observd) does best become
them, as well as a greater latitude, for so they have sometimes been enlarg dto
almost a whole vacuity, unles where for their better fortifying, we find half,
and sometimes whole Columns applied to them. Where they support large
Cornices and Freezes in Wainscoted Rooms they do properly and handsomly,
provided their due proportions be observed, vithout those ridiculous disguisements -
of Pedistals and idle fancies which we find frequently wrought about
them. Also in Chimm-pieces, Fronts of Buildings, Galleries, and Door-cases
from whence they were nam d Anta: The
Ante.
Imposts (by Vitruvius call'd Incumba) which I mention d, are nothing but
Incumbae
their Capitels or more protuberant heads, upon which fest the ends of the
Arches; but where they exceed the Square and regular thicknes, they were
Pile,
nam'd.
