Читать книгу The Englishman's House: A Practical Guide for Selecting and Building a House онлайн

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The same author considers that there is not the least certainty of this primitive wooden construction, with its inclined roof, having been the universal model of all nations, but especially in regard to Egypt and China. The peculiarities of the early Chinese style of architecture have been already named, and with the persistent continuity in one course yet prevalent, that style is still preserved. But the Grecian style was evidently founded on the rude model, and the ingenuity of that nation eventually led to the transference of material from wood to stone.

At the present day the Orders of Grecian architecture are fundamental to the principles of modern art in numerous varieties of detail; they have survived the prejudices, fancies, and dicta of various schools of art, although, as already shown, the Gothic and other systems have become formidable competitors, and in many cases, especially in regard to the picturesque, efficient, elegant, and ornamental substitutes. The taste for the latter characteristic has led to an increased adoption, for example, of the Italian style, which in many respects resembles the Grecian, but differs from it especially in lightness of detail, with greater variety. The author just quoted traces the origin of the Doric Order of the Greeks to a primary adaptation of the trunks of trees as external supports of the wooden dwelling, seeing in them the foreshadowing of the column designative of that order. “As trees are of greater circumference at their lower extremities, and diminish in rising, the diminution of the column was suggested by them.... These timbers (as supports) consisting of trunks of trees planted in the ground, offered not as yet the idea of bases and pedestals, as is seen in the Doric Order, which is without base. But in the course of time the inconvenience of this method was perceived, as it exposed the wood to rot, and to remedy this inconvenience pieces of wood were placed under each support to give it a better foundation, and to protect it from humidity. This practice may be traced in some of the ancient edifices in which the columns have no other base than a block of stone. But afterwards, the number of pieces of wood employed for the base was increased, in order to give greater elevation to the supports, or to effect better security against the effects of humidity. From this multiplication of blocks as footings, sprung the torus and other mouldings of the base, an origin far more probable than that of ligaments of iron, as imagined by Scamozzi and others. It is also more conformable to the nature of capitals, in which it is known that the same proceeding was employed. After beginning with a simple abacus, several others were afterwards added, which were enlarged, as they rose, one above another, in such a manner that as the base was to the column a kind of footing on which it rested more solidly, so the capital made a head more capable of receiving and supporting the weight and form of the architrave, a large beam placed horizontally on perpendicular supports, and destined to receive the covering of the whole edifice.”