J. M. von Mauch · Caryatids, Entablatures and Proportions

Plate 88. Proportions of the Orders

2 live illustrations in this chapter

Entasis of Columns:

The column shaft was not tapered in a straight line by the old masters, but with a swelling (entasis) from the bottom up. Later the lower third of the column shaft was kept cylindrical and the entasis started from that point. The fillet over the base, as also the upper astragal (the projection of which is always the same as the lower column diameter, or two modules) is counted as a part of the column shaft. Fig. 1 represents a column shaft with the entasis starting at the bottom, and Fig. 2 a shaft where the entasis starts at one-third the way up. The method of obtaining the entasis for the latter can also be used for the shafts having an entasis the whole height.

Fig. 1The later method of Plate 88: the shaft cylindrical for its lower third, the entasis beginning above. Open in Models ↗

Rules for tapering Shafts of heights from 15 ft. to 50 ft.:

The diagrams at the lower left corner of the plate give the different degrees of taper for shafts of different heights. These varying proportions have no bearing on the height of capitals.

Relation of the Entablature to the height of the Column:

At the upper left corner of the plate are diagrams showing the proportion of entablatures to columns of different heights.

Intercolumniations of Columns:

When the columns are placed with 1[…] diameters between them the spacing is called Pyknostyle; with 2 diameters Systyle; with […] diameters Eustyle; with 3 diameters Diastyle; with more than 3 diameters Arseostyle. If the columns are placed with only 1[…] diameters between, they are kept slender and are made 10 diameters high; with 2 diameters 9[…]; with 2[…] diameters 9; with 3 diameters 8[…], and with more than 3 diameters only 8 high. The corner column is made 1-50 stronger than the others, because the light background on account of its intensity apparently reduces the thickness of the column. The center space at a Prostyle is made […] of a diameter wider at the Eustyle and yet narrower spacings.

Fig. 2The intercolumniations from pycnostyle to araeostyle, each with the column height Vitruvius assigns: the closer the columns, the more slender (Plate 88). Open in Models ↗

Frontons, from Vitruvius and Serlio:

The upper, right figures give the methods of Vitruvius and of Serlio for proportions of pediments, or frontons.

Public-domain text (1910), transcribed from the archive.org OCR of the Architectural Reprint edition and cleaned for reading: line-end hyphens rejoined, running heads, page numbers and the German and French captions engraved on the plates removed, and obvious misreadings corrected. Fractions the scan does not show legibly are marked […]; words lost at a page edge are restored in [brackets]. The nomenclature lists of Plates 23, 24, 29, 49, 75 and 82 are set as running text. Mauch’s plates (from his German edition of 1845) are not reproduced; the live figures are this book’s own.