Architecture Flashcards
Descriptive of two figures placed front to front
Affronted
Aisle around the sanctuary of a church.
Ambulatory
Outwork defending the entrance to a castle
Barbican
The italian Renaissance architecture of the 16th century; also used for its 19th-century revival.
Cinquecento
Walling material of clay mixed with straw
Cob or pis
Continuous layer of stones, bricks etc. in a wall
Course
A stained-glass techinque invented in the mid-20th century,setting large, thick pieces of cast glass into a frame of reinforced concrete or epoxy resin
Dalle-de-verre (lit. glass slab)
Rooms in a formal series, usually with all the doorways on axis
Enfilade
A church with nave and aisles of approximately equal height
Hall-church
Bricks, tiles, stones or (sometimes) timbers laid diagonally, usually in superimposed alternate courses
Herringbone work
A girder with braced framework
Lattice girder
A monolithic slab laid flat over a grave or tomb
Ledger slab
The setting of a brass or other inlaid material
Matrix
A style used from c. 1860, in which tile-hanging, tall chimneys, half timbering and other details of the gabled vernacular architecture of south-east England are picturesquely combined
Old English
In a church, a gallery in which the organ is placed
Organ loft
Wide convex moulding
Ovolo
Long straight braces in a timber roof, passing across other members of the truss
Passing braces
Open-ended ground-level passage through a building
Pend (Scots)
On a classical building, a colonnade all round the exterior or an interior space, e.g. a courtyard
Peristyle
Ornamental or pictorial inlay by means of thin slabs of stone
Pietra dura
Mortar joints formed with a trowel so that they stand out
Ribbon pointing
Screen that was placed below a representation of the Crucifixion
Rood screen
A stair in a circular well with a central supporting newel
Spiral stair, vice or turnpike stair (Scots)
Underside of an arch, lintel, etc.
Soffit (lit. ceiling)
Roof truss incorporated in a spere
Spere truss
Sculpted or painted group of arms or armour
Trophy
Bricks or tiles fired to a darkened glassy surface
Vitrified
Wedge-shaped stones forming an arch
Voussoirs
Term for the type of large tripartite sash window with narrower side lights and a segmental arch above, made popular by a family of architects in the late 18th century
Wyatt window
Abbotsford House (aka Carley Hole)
Galashiels (Scotland)
Mayor renovation 1817-1825
Residence of Walter Scott
Pioneer in the popularisation of the Scottish Baronial style
In a timber roof, purlins or horizontal longitudinal timbers which rest on queenposts or are carried in the angle between principals and collar.
Clasped purlins
Large irregular polygonal stones, smooth and finely jointed
Cyclopean masonry
Of masonry, carved in the form of icicles
Glaciated masonry of frost-work
Wooden or metal bars separating and supporting window panes
Glazing bars
In a hammerbeam roof, vertical timbers between the hammerbeams (horizontal brackets projecting at wall plate level) and the purlins (horizontal longitudinal timbers); braced to a collar-beam above
Hammerposts
An arch framing an opening in a wall, e.g. a window or door
Overarch
Painting or relief above an internal door
Overdoor or sopraporta
Pier composed of grouped shafts, or a solid core surrounded by shafts
Compound pier
Groove cut in masonry, especially to receive the edge of a roof-covering
Raggle
Asymmetrical arrangements of unworked rocks, or its imitation in other materials, associated especially with the Rococo style
Rocaille or rockwork
A square dome or vault of one continuous curve with the same diameter as the diagonal of the square, so that it rises from pendentives between arches.
Sail dome or sail vault
Horizontal longitudnal timbers in a roof structure which are trenched into the backs of the principals
Trenched purlins
Brickwork pattern comprising pairs of sailors laid side-by-side, capped with a shiner, alternating with pairs of sailors laid side-by-side sat atop a shiner
Single Basket Weave bond
Ornament in the Early English period of Gothic, consisting of a series of small pyramids formed by four stylized canine teeth meeting at a point
Dogtooth
Stone that is cut, or can be cut, in all directions
Freestone
Semicircular window or blind panel
Lunette
Long terraced strip of soil on the downward side of prehistoric and medieval fields, accumulated because of continual ploughing along the contours
Lynchet
Wooden lining to interior walls, made up of vertical members (muntins) and horizontals (rails) framing panels
Panelling or wainscot
The Scottish term for a hipped roof, i.e. with sloping rather than gabled ends
Piended roof
Ragged (in heraldry). Also applied to funerary sculpture
Raguly
Covering of overlapping slates on a wall
Slate-hanging (hence slate-hung wall)
A buttress set at 90 degrees at the angle of a building.
Angle buttress
Small stones set in a mortar course
Galleting
In a roof structure, a vertical timber set centrally on a tie-beam, rising to the apex of the roof to support a ridge-piece
Kingpost
Sloped or pitched
Raked
Brickwork with only the long sides of the bricks showing
Stretcher bond
Revival of Regency as a fashionable style in the 1920-50s
Vogue Regency
A bay window which rests on corbels or brackets and starts above ground level
Oriel
An arch spanning a main axis (e.g. of a vaulted space)
Transverse arch (Diaphragm arch?)
Circular window with tracery radiating from the centre
Rose window
One of the orders of classical architecture in which the capital of the column combines the volutes of the Ionic order with the foliage of the Corinthian (image: bottom right)
Composite
A curved or angle-ended stage at the bottom of a bridge pier
Cutwater, starling or sterling
A fixed structure screening the lower end of the great hall from the screens passage
Spere
Inner curve or underside of an arch (image: number 5)
Intrados
An arch inserted in an opening to resist inward pressure
Strainer arch
Of a roof: with the spaces between the timbers filled, to form an internal partition or partitions
Closed truss
(Presbyterianism) A room or separate building for meetings of the elders who form a kirk session, or a shelter by the entrance to a church or churchyard for an elder collecting for poor relief; built at the expense of a kirk session
Session house (Scots)
Series of convex mouldings, the reverse of fluting
Reeding
One of the main elements of a rib-vault, crossing diagonally and marking the main divisions (called cells)
Diagonal rib
Containing a column of water to regulate pressure in water mains
Standpipe tower, also called a monometer tower
In a roof structure, a vertical timber placed centrally on a tie-beam, not directly supporting longitudinal timbers
King-strut (compare queen-strut)
Masonry laid on the diagonal, often alternately with opposing courses
Pitched masonry
Subsidiary member of a structural frame or roof, often arranged in decorative patterns in timber-framed buildings
Brace
Central stair to a doorway, usually of double-curved plan
Perron
Inclined lateral timbers supporting the roof covering
Rafters
The style of the Middle Ages from the later 12th century to the Renaissance, with which it co-existed in certain forms into the 17th century. Characterized in its full development by the pointed arch, the rib-vault and an often skeletal masonry structure for churches, combined with large glazed windows
Gothic
A spire starting from a square base, then carried into an octagonal section by means of triangular faces
Broach spire
Projecting moulding above an arch or lintel to throw off water
Hoodmould. When horizontal often called a label
Series of arches supported by piers or columns when applied to a wall.
Blind arcade or arcading
Monumental building or chamber usually intended for the burial of members of one family
Mausoleum
Decorative fixed arch between two gatepiers or above a gate, often of iron
Overthrow
A rough-textured roach with small cavities and fossil shells
Portland roach
Not to be confused with the actual architecture of this queen’s reign, this usually refers to a later Victorian style that sought to revive the domestic classical manner of the mid 17th century. It favoured red brick or terracotta, usually combined with white-painted woodwork. It is particularly associated with the architect Richard Norman Shaw (1831-1912) and with the turn away from the Gothic Revival
Queen Anne
Ornament in the form of drapery suspended from both ends
Swag
A chapel dedicated to the Virgin Mary
Lady chapel
In classical architecture, collective name for the three horizontal members (architrave, frieze and cornice) carried by a wall
Entablature
One in which the structure is carried by a framework -e.g. of steel, reinforced concrete or timber- instead of by load-bearing walls
Framed building
Forecourts to groups of houses shared by vehicles and pedestrians
Mixer-courts
Stone screen in a major church dividing choir from nave
Pulpitum
Top of the solid platform on which a classical colonnade (crepidoma) stands
Stylobate
Row of rooms
Pile (the most common use of the term is in “double pile”, describing a building, especially a house, that is two rooms deep
A form of mosaic using simple geometrical patterns and coloured stones, developed in Italy in the 12th and 13th centuries
Cosmati work
The architecture of the British Isles in the reigns of George I, II, III and IV, i.e. 1714-1830, in which the classical style and classical proportions became the norm for both major and minor buildings
Georgian
A screen separating a chapel from the rest of the church
Parclose screen
Water wheel with water feeding it on the top but falling backwards
Pitchback water wheel or Backshot water wheel
A roof with sloped ends instead of gables
Hipped roof
Decoration scratched, often in plaster, to reveal a pattern in another colour beneath
Sgraffito
Projecting points formed by curves within the arches or tracery of Gothic architecture
Cusps
The earliest form of tracery, introduced c. 1200, in which shapes are cut through solid masonry
Plate tracery
Horizontal longitudinal timber in a roof structure(image: grey parts)
Purlin
A bridge with arches rising above the roadway which is suspended from them
Bowstring bridge or tied-arch bridge
Projecting housing for a hoist pulley on an upper storey of warehouses, mills, etc., for raising goods to the loading doors
Lucam
Ornamental lookout tower or raised summerhouse
Gazebo (jocular lating “I shall gaze”)
Girder of hollow-box section
Box girder
Projection of the tread of a step
Nosing
A hipped roof which turns to a gablet at the ridge
Gambrel roof
Very slight convex deviation from a straight line, used for aesthetic purposes
Entasis
An opening embellished with alternating or intermittent blocks, seen particularly in the work of James Gibbs (1682-1754)
Gibbs surround
A flat board with shaped sides, especially a baluster
Splat
Neolithic burial mound with a stone-built chamber and entrance passage covered by an earthen barrow or stone cairn
Chambered tomb
With multiple lobes (foils) formed by the cusping of a circular or other shape in a tracery
Multifoil
Uppermost storey of a church, pierced by windows. also high-level windows in secular buildings
Clerestory or clearstorey
A defensive ditch
Fosse or moat
Relief desings in metalwork, formed by beating it from the back
Repoussé
Calcined lime or clay
Cement
The place of assembly for the members of a monastery or cathedral, usually located off the east side of the cloister
Chapter house
A chamfer applied to each of two recessed arches
Double chamfer
In heraldry, a complete display of armorial bearings.
Achievement
Medieval carved flower or leaf ornament, often rectilinear
Fleuron
A rounded bartizan or turret, usually roofless.
Round (Scots)
Originally a Roman country house or farm. The term was revived in England in the 18th century under the influence of Palladio and used for smaller, compact country houses. In the later 19th century it was debased to describe any suburban house
Villa
A slopped member of a staircase covering the ends of the treads and risers, with a continuous upper edge.
Closed string
Screen that separates a chapel from the rest of the church
Parclose screen
String with a continuous upper edge that covers the ends of the treads and risers
Closed string
Dining hall of a monastery, college or similar establishment
Refectory, frater, frater-house or fratery
A hollow classical moulding, especially on a column base. Concave with a lower edge projecting beyond the top and so used at the base of columns as a transition between two torus moldings with different diameters
Scotia
Ceiling with a pronounced cove joining the walls to a flat central panel smaller than the whole area of the ceiling
Coved ceiling
Shape chiselled out of a stone to receive a monumental brass
Indent
A raised platform at one end of a medieval hall, where the lord or head of the household dined; also found in college or school halls, etc.
Dais
Pilaster without base or capital
Pilaster strip or lesene
Memorial slab raised on free-standing legs
Table tomb
Series of arches supported by piers or columns.
Arcade
Of concrete, textured with hammers after casting
Hammer-dressed
Slight rise or upward curve in place of a horizontal line or plane
Camber
Of a temple: with a colonnade all round the exterior
Peripteral
Masonry with courses broken by smaller stones
Snecked
In a rib-vault, an extra decorative rib springing from the corner of a bay
Tierceron (hence tierceron vault) or lierne
The joining of two stones to prevent them slipping, by a notch in one and a projection in the other
Joggle
Medieval ornament with a chain of tiny triangles placed obliquely
Nutmeg
Interval between columns
Intercolumniation
The surface between arches that meet at an angle, formed as part of hemisphere and supporting a drum, dome or vault (image: shown in yellow)
Pendentive
Principal floor of a classical building, above a ground floor or basement and with a lesser storey
Piano nobile
Tomb-chest with effiegies beneath a flat canopy (tester), either free-standing (tester with four or more columns) , or attached to a wall (half-tester) with columns on one side only )
Tester tomb
An arch spanning responds not diametrically opposed
Skew arch or oblique arch
An artfully rustic small house associated with the Picturesque movement
Cottage orné
Horizontal projection supported at one end only
Cantilever
With battlements. Also a kind of I shaped beam
Castellated
In a church or chapel, rails used to enclose an area around the altar or communion table
Communion rails or altar rails
Of an architrave, with side projections at the top
Eared or lugged
A vertical timber in a roof structure, set centrally on a tie-beam and supporting a collar purlin, with longitudinal braces to it. In an open truss, additional braces may rise laterally to the collar-beam; in a closed truss the may descend to the tie-beam
Crown-post
Small oval window, set horizontally
Bullseye window or oeil de boeuf
Balustrade applied to the wall surface
Blind balustrade
Pattern of brickwork with two courses of headers (half off-set by alternately stretching and heading three-quarter bats at the quoins) followed by two courses of stretchers (quarter off-set, also by alternately stretching and heading three-quarter bats at the quoins)
Double English Cross bond
A five-lobed opening
Cinquefoil
Moulding along the top of the dado (image: middle horizontal element)
Dado rail
A form of bar tracery used in the early 14th century, with net-like patterns of ogee- (double-curved) ended lozenges
Reticulated tracery
Purlins tenoned into either side of the principals
Butt purlins or tenoned purlins
Chamber or stage in a tower where the bells are hung
Belfry
20th-century term for pillars or stilts that support a building above an open ground floor
Pilotis
A joint in which the stones or bricks do not overlap
Butt-joint
A brick cut to complete a bond
Closer
Roofed gateway entrance to a churchyard for the reception of a coffin
Lychgate (lit. corpse-gate)
A tower containing a column of water to regulate pressure in water mains
Manometer tower or standpipe tower
The moulded frame of a door or window with horizontal and vertical projections at the top angles
Shouldered architrave
Brickwork pattern made by placing a sailor to one side of a shiner making an ‘L’ shape, then repeatedly nesting further such combinations. It can be rotated by 45º
Herringbone bond
Circular or polygonal stage suporting a dome or cupola. Also one of the stones forming the shaft of a column
Drum or tholobate
The self-conscious and often scrupulously accurate use of Gothic architecture for its historical or religious associations. It began in the 17th century and reached its peak in the 19th
Gothic Revival
The medieval type of altar with taller framed hangings on three sides, as revived in the late 19th century
English altar
Polished composition covering giving the effect of (usually coloured) marble, used especially on columns from the mid-18th to early 19th century
Scagliola
Exaggerated treatment of masonry to give an effect of strength. The joints are usually recessed.
Rustication
de: Rustizierung
fr: Bugnato
A portico whose columns are on the same plane as the front of the building
Portico in antis
A pediment with its apex omitted
Broken pediment
A style of architecture with its origins in the sixteenth century, drawing on the features of Medieval castles, tower houses and the French Renaissance châteaux. Pioneered by figures including Sir Walter Scott, in the nineteenth century it was revived as part of the Gothic Revival and remained popular until World War I, with extensive use in Scotland and examples in Ireland, Canada, and New Zealand. The distinguishing features are vertical rather than horizontal proportions, small windows, steep roofs, small turrets or tourelles, and a sparing use of Renaissance ornament.
Scottish or Scotch Baronial
Decorated with leaves
Foliate
Sill displaying a pronounced convex upper edge
Bull-nosed sill
A pediment with the centre of the base omitted
Open pediment
Column that partly merges into a wall or pier
Engaged or attached column
The revival of the British and Irish architecture of the 18th and early 19th centuries. It often depends for its effects on sash windows, symmetry and carefully calculated proportions rather than on displays of columns and grand formal features. At its peak in the 1920s, it can be traced back to the late 19th century and is still current as a style
Neo-Georgian
In an abbey or monastery, a room for talking to visitors in; in a medieval house, the semi-private living room below the solar or upper chamber
Parlour
Of a stair-rail, dado, etc: with a steep concave curve just short of the newel, or in line with it
Ramped
Of a porch or portico: with six columns across the front
Hexastile
Principal tower of a castle
Keep
Lobe formed by the cusping of a circular or other shape in tracery.
Foil (trefoil, quatrefoil, cinquefoil, sexfoil or multifoil depending on the numbers of lobes)
Wall decoration adopted from Roman examples in the Renaissance. Its foliage scrolls incorporate figurative elements. Also used for a figure or head with distorted or unnatural features in medieval art and architecture
Grotesque
Simplest kind of vault, in the form of a continuous semicircular or pointed arch
Barrel vault or tunnel vault
Small rectangular trap in the ceiling of an entrance passage in a castle or tower house
Murder hole
Painted and/or sculpted screen behind and above an altar
Reredos
Stone-lined or slab-built grave
Cist
Brick or masonry courses built out beyond one another to support a chimneystack, window, etc
Corbelling
The upper part of an arch or vault
Crown
Horizontal timber laid in parallel to support the floor of a building
Joists
In timber construction, one of the paired inclined timbers making up a cruck
Blade
Ritual earthwork
Henge
An arch shaped like a chain suspended from two level points, but inverted
Parabolic arch
Platform, doorstep or landing
Platt (Scots)
Circular opening
Oculus
On a Greek Doric column, an ovolo or wide convex moulding below the abacus or top part of the capital
Echinus
A concealed door, made flush with the wall surface and treated to resemble it
Gib door or jib door
A pair of volutes, turned outwards to meet at the corner of a capital
Angle volute
Rectangular architectural element that fills the space between two triglyphs in a Doric frieze, in which this element alternates with triglyphs. They often had painted or sculptural decoration; the most famous example is the frieze of the Parthenon marbles depicting the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths.
Metope
Form of pointing that has joints formed with a trowel so that they stand out
Ribbon pointing
Late Iron Age stone dwelling, round with partition walls like wheel spokes
Wheel house (Scots)
Diagonal projection at the base of a moulding, column, or buttress
Spur
(Canals): Beam projecting horizontally for opening and closing lock gates.
Balance beam
Dense bricks, originally used mostly for railway viaducts, etc
Engineering bricks
Opening for a firearm
Gunloop
A broken pediment with double curved sides
Swan-neck pediment
A distinctive phase of English Gothic which developed at the end of the 13th century and continued into the later 14th. Named from its elaborate window tracery, which abandoned the simple circular forms of Geometric in favour of more varied patterns based on segments of circles
Decorated
Arch or series of arches thrown across an interior angle of a square or rectangular structure to support a circular or polygonal superstructure, especially a dome or spire
Squinch
Column decorated with carved prows of ships to celebrate a naval victory
Columna rostrata
A pew enclosed by a high wooden back and ends, the latter having doors
Box pew
In a church or chapel, a recess or cupboard to hold sacred vessels for the Mass.
Aumbry
Stone construction without mortar
Dry-stone
Covering for the front of an altar
Frontal
Extra thickness of the lower part of a wall, e.g. to carry a floor
Scarcement
Of a hill-fort: defended by two concentric banks and ditches
Bivallate
Simple geometrical patterns cut into a surface
Chip-carving
A tower above a crossing
Crossing tower
A type of bar tracery used c. 1300, formed by interlocking mullions each branching out in two curved bars of the same raius but different centres
Intersecting tracery
Classical ornament of leafy scrolls branching alternately to left and right
Rinceau
A cross with four arms of equal length
Greek cross
Rotating ladder for access to nesting boxes in a doocot (dovecote)
Potence (Scots)
On a railway, an L-section rail for plain unflanged wheels
Plate rail
Roughly triangular spaces between an arch and its containing rectangle, or between adjacent arches. Also non-structural panels under the windows, especially on a curtain-walled building
Spandrels
Scottish Baronial style:
Distinguishing features
Vertical rather than horizontal proportions
Small windows
Steep roofs
Small turrets or tourelles
Sparing use of Renaissance ornament.
A semicircular glazed opening, usually above a door, typical of Georgian architecture; sometimes used by extension for a rectangular glazed opening over a door
Fanlight
An ornamental projection or boss at the end of a label or hoodmould
Label stop
Exposed mortar jointing of masonry or brickwork with a narrow central channel filled with finer, whiter mortar
Tuck pointing
Hard and brittle iron, cast in a mould to the required shape rather than forged
Cast iron
A small balcony or window-guard attached to an individual window.
Balconette or balconet
English version of late Gothic, developed from the 1320s., which continued into the early 16 century. Characterised by large windows with a grid pattern of mullions and transoms, with the mullions continuing to the head to the arch, which is often of flattened or four-centred form. This motif of panel tracery is used also for wall decoration, and on the fan vaults that were used for the most prestigious buildings
Perpendicular
A series of pilasters or flat representation of classical columns, equivalent to a colonnade
Pilastrade
Tall pyramidal or conical feature crowning a tower or turret
Spire
Brickwork pattern comprising pairs of shiners laid atop one another, alternating with pairs of sailors laid side-by-side
Double Basket Weave bond
Male figures supporting an entablature.
Atlantes
Trimmed (knapped) flint used with dressed stone to form patterns
Flushwork
Large convex moulding usually used on a classical column base
Torus (pl. tori)
Stair wiht parallel flights rising alternately in opposite directions, without an open well
Dog-leg stair or scale and platt stair
Shallow segmental vault springing from beams, used for fireproof floors, bridge decks, etc
Jack arch
Medieval roll moulding on a soffit
Soffit roll
Exterior plaster decoration, either moulded in relief or incised
Pargeting (lit. plastering)
Non-figurative surface decoration consisting of flowing lines, foliage scrolls etc., based on geometrical patterns
Arabesque
An arch spanning piers at a crossing
Crossing arch
The dormitory of an abbey or monastery, traditionally placed in the east range off the cloister
Dorter
A chamfer with a concave surface
Hollow chamfer
An arch with four arcs, the lower two curving inward more than the upper, with a blunt central point; typical of late medieval English architecture
Four-centred arch
Brickwork pattern with three to nine couses of stretchers for every course of headers
American bond or common bond
Flat-topped ledge with moulded underside, projecting along the top of a building or feature, especially as the highest member of the classical entablature. Also the decorative moulding in the angle between wall and ceiling
Cornice
Lintel carved with the initials of the owner and his wife and the date of building work
Marriage lintel (only coincidentally of their marriage)
A style of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, based on the works of the English Baroque architect Sir Christopher Wren (1632-1723) and his contemporaries
Edwardian Baroque, Neo-Wren or Wrenaissance
Of a hill-fort: defended by three concentric banks and ditches
Trivallate
A portico with six columns
Hexastyle portico
Chest-shaped tomb, usually of stone
Tomb-chest
Rustication with only the horizontal joints emphasized
Banded rustication
A small spike- or turret-like termination of a buttress, parapet, etc., especially in Gothic architecture
Pinnacle
A defensive feature on a parapet, so called from the regular openings in it; the whole forming battlements
Crenellation
Two-dimensional painting or decoration in which objects are represented three-dimensionally
Trompe l’oeil
In a church or chapel, a free-standing basin for washing Mass vessels
Pillar piscina
Horizontal member at the bottom of a window or door frame. Also the horizontal member at the base of a timber-framed wall, into which the posts and studs are tenoned
Sill or cill
A circular window with radiationg shafts like spokes
Wheel window (compare rose window)
The first phase of English Gothic architecture, predominant in the period c-1180-1250, and making use of the pointed arch for openings and vaulting. Frequent use of single narrow windows, that can be grouped together to form plate tracery. Larger arches frequently have narrow multiple mouldings, heavily undercut. Stiff-leaf ornament in high relief, and compound piers (i-e- with groups of shafts), often making use of Purbeck marble, are also characteristic of the period
Early English or Lancet style
A late-19th-century approach to design, seen at its strongest in interiors and furniture, which rejected the moral fervour behind the Gothic Revival in favour of ‘art for art’s sake’. The results were often eclectic, drawing typically on Renaissance, Oriental and ancient Greek sources. It overlapped with the early Arts and Crafts movement and the Queen Anne style.
Aesthetic Movement
Usually describes the vaulted room(s) beneath the main room(s) of a medieval house
Undercroft (compare crypt)
Mezzanine floor subdividing what is structurally a single storey, e.g. a vault
Entresol
A gallery or room with regular openings along one main side, sometimes free-standing
Loggia
Exposed mortar jointing of masonry or brickwork. It can be flush or recessed
Pointing
Framed construction in which the loads are taken by cross-walls of concrete or brick
Cross-wall construction
Corbelled turret, square or round, frequently at an angle
Bartizan or guerite
Carved figure attached to a medieval column or shaft, usually flanking a doorway
Column figure
Round or oval classical ornament in shallow relief
Patera (lit. plate)
An (internal?) dome of flattened profile
Saucer dome
Buddhist shrine, circular in plan
Stupa
A continuous raised platform supporting a building; or a large block of two or three storeys beneath a multi-storey block of smaller area
Podium
Vertical member of round or polygonal section, including the main part of a classical column, and by extension also of a pilaster
Shaft
Frieze of bold convex profile. Also a horizontal band of ornament
Pulvinated frieze
Lines of tiny stones used decoratively in the mortar joints
Pins or pinning
A girder of I-section, made from iron or steel plates
Plate girder
A semicircular window with two mullions, as used in the Baths of Diocletian, Rome
Thermal window or Diocletian window
Small square block used in series in classical cornices.
Dentil
One of a series of recessed archers and jambs forming a splayed medieval opening, e.g. a doorway or arcade arch. Also, an upright structural member used in series, especially in classical architecture
Order
A curved dagger-shaped motif in tracery, popular especially in the 14th century
Mouchette
Classical tablet with ornate frame
Cartouche
Window of one or more storeys projecting from the face of a buiding.
Bay window
A narrow flat band running down a medieval shaft or along a roll moulding. It separates larger curved mouldings in classical cornices, fluting or bases
Fillet
An arched stone roof, sometimes imitated in timber, plaster, etc.
Vault
Curved paired braces forming an arch, connecting wall or post below with tie-beam or collar beam above.
Arched braces
Horizontal beam or stone bridging an opening
Lintel
A corridor crypt surrounding the apse of an early medieval church, often associated with chambers for relics
Ring crypt
Decorative mosaic-like facing
Opus sectile (compare tessellated mosaic)
The area enclosed by a cloister
Cloister garth
In a timber roof, horizontal brackets projecting at wall-plate level like an interrupted tie-beam; the inner ends carry hammerposts, vertical timbers which support a purlin (horizontal longitudinal timber) and are braced to a collar-beam above
Hammerbeans
The solid uprights of a battlement
Merlons
A corbelled turret or bartizan, square or round, frequently at an angle
Pepperpot turret
Stylized drops below the triglyphs of the frieze in the Doric order of classical architecture
Guttae
An arch with arcs in each corner and a flat centre or lintel
Shouldered arch
A type of classical ornament used on convex (ovolo) mouldings, based on alternate eggs and arrowheads
Egg-and-dart
The middle member of the classical entablature, sometimes ornamented
Frieze
Small gabled opening in a roof or spire
Lucarne
Of a porch or portico: with eight columns across the front
Octostyle
A gable with curved sides
Shaped gable
Raised panel below a window or wall monument or tablet (image: below upper windows)
Apron
On a railway, a rail on which flanged wheels can run
Edge rail
Pedestal or pilaster tapering downward, usually with the upper part of a human figure growing out of it; sometimes called a terminal figure
Term
Overhanging edge of a roof
Eaves
A porch with the roof and frequently a pediment supported by a row of columns. They are described by the number of columns (distyle, tetrastyle…)
Portico
Stones (quoins) at the angle or corner of a buiding placed with the long side alternately upright and horizontal, especially in Anglo-Saxon structures
Long-and-short work
Continuous course of projecting stones or bricks serving as support
Corbel course
The space within the portico of a classical temple
Pronaos
The finishing (often with panelling) of the lower part of a wall, usually in a classical interior; in origin a formalized continuous pedestal
Dado
Pilaster set at the end of a colonnade, arcade etc. to balance visually the column which it faces
Pilaster respond
Horizontal longitudinal timbers in a roof structure which are tenoned into either side of the principals
Tenoned purlins or butt purlins
Sloping or shaped stones finishing a gable upstanding from the roof
Skew (Scots)
Low storey between two higher ones
Mezzanine
Shelved, niched structure to house multiple burials
Columbarium
The Italian Renaissance architecture of the 15th century; also used for its 19th-century revival
Quattrocento
A multi-storey block with flats fanning out from a central core of lifts, staircases etc.
Point block
Painting on wet plaster
Al fresco
Upright structural member, of iron, steel or reinforced concrete. Also a framework consisting of two or more vertical bars, used to secure cattle in a stall or at a feed trough
Stanchion
A window with one mullion and one transom, forming a cross-shape
Cross window
An order whose height is that of two or more storeys of the building to which it is applied
Giant or colossal order
Roof opening, often protected by a raised timber structure, to allow the smoke from a central hearth to escape; also one of a series of horizontal boards or slats set at angle to prevent rain entering an opening
Louvre
Small brackets or consoles along the underside of a Corinthian or Composite cornice. Often also used on an eaves cornice
Modillions
A vault with two pairs of diagonal ribs dividing each bay into four triangular compartments or cells
Quadripartite rib-vault
In Orthodox churches, the screen that divides off the sanctuary, usually decorated with sacred images (icons)
Iconostasis
The body of a church west of the crossing or chancel, often flanked by aisles
Nave
A type of timber construction in which the main supports or blades are formed from more than one timber; the lower member may act as a wall-post; it is usually elbowed at wallplate level and jointed just above
Jointed cruck
Pairs of longitudinal timbers placed some way up the slope of the roof, which carry common rafters
Side purlins
System of manufactured units assembled on site
Pre-engineered building, system building or industrial building
The arrangement of windows in a façade
Fenestration
Brickwork infilling of a timber-framed wall
Nogging
A vault with a masonry framework of intersecting arches (ribs) supporting cells, used in Gothic and late Norman architecture
Rib-vault
A brick laid with its long side outermost
Stretcher
A term used for the architecture of Ancient Greece and rome, revived at the Renaissance and subsequently imitated around the Western world. It uses a range of conventional forms, the roots of which are the orders, or types of column each with its fixed proportions and ornaments.
Classical
Bracket of curved outline
Console
Brickwork pattern with five courses of stretchers between every course of headers
Scottish bond
Late 16th and early 17th-century decoration, like interlaced leather straps
Strapwork
Flat representation of a classical column in shallow relief
Pilaster
Carved ornament of leaves and flowers as a termination or finial on top of a bench end or stall
Poppyhead
Brickwork pattern made of four bricks surrounding a square half-brick, repeated in a square grid
Pinwheel bond
Topmost ornamental feature, e.g. above a spire, gable or cupola
Finial
In a medieval house or college, a room off the screens passage, used for storing provisions
Pantry (compare buttery)
Splayed opening in a wall or battlement
Embrasure
A development of (especially) British Modernist architecture from the late 1960s, marked by the celebratory display of construction and services, a preference for lightweight materials and sheer surfaces, and a readiness to adopt new techniques from engineering and other technologies
High tech
Path along the inner face of a rampart
Rampart walk
Site of the chief shrine of a church, behind the high altar
Feretory
Horizontal longitudinal timbers in a roof structure which are trenched into the backs of the principals
Trenched purlins
Male head or bust on a pedestal
Herm (lit. the god Hermes)
Used for any compact and ornate building like a large Italian town house, usually classical in style
Palazzo
Shaped ornamental strip of continuous section, e.g. the classical cavetto, cyma or ovolo
Moulding
An ogee or double-curved pointed arch that also projects forward at the top
Nodding ogee
A sloping member of a staircase covering the ends of the treads and risers and cut into their shape
Open string (hence open-string staircase)
Defensive outer wall of stone or earth
Rampart
Small supporting piece of stone, etc., to carry a projecting horizontal member
Bracket
A ring around a circular pier or a shaft attached to a pier, typical of the 12th and 13th centuries
Annulet or shaft-ring
A roof continuing down in one plane over a lower projection
Catslide
Vertical supports of bellied or any other form, for a handrail or coping.
Baluster
Window projecting from the slope of a roof
Dormer
Peaked external wall at the end of a double-pitch roof (image: highlighted in yellow)
Gable
Formal entrance court before a house, usually with flanking wings and a screen wall or gates
Cour d’honneur
One of the orders of classical architecture, a simpler variant of Roman Doric
Tuscan
The European imitation of Chinese motifs in the mid-18th century, seen most commonly in the decorative arts, but also used for interiors and for the occasional complete building
Chinoiserie
A monument attached to the wall. They are smaller than a wall monument, with the inscription as the major element
Tablet or wall tablet
Chancel with a surrounding aisle (ambulatory) and radiating chapels
Chevet
Type of medieval timber-framed house common in Kent and Sussex, with a central open hall flanked by bays of two storeys, roofed in line; the end bays are jettied to the front, but the eaves are continuous
Wealden house
On a castle, a series of openings between the corbels that support a projecting parapet through which missiles can be dropped. Used decoratively on post-medieval buildings
Machicolations (lit. mashing devices)
Holes in a wall to receive the horizontal timbers which support scaffolding boards; sometimes not filled after construction is complete
Putlog holes, putlock holes or putholes
Fixed seat in the choir or chancel of a church for the clergy or choir. Usually with armrests, and often framed together
Stall or choir stall
Vertical member between window lights
Mullion
Shield for a coat of arms or other heraldic display
Escutcheon
Of concrete, the impression of boards left by the temporary timber framing (formwork) used for casting
Board-marked
Of a column: one that partly merges into a wall or pier.
Attached
Rafters which also act as principals, i.e. the paired inclined lateral timbers of a truss
Principal rafters
Projecting courses at the foot of a wall or column, generally cut back (chamfered) or moulded at the top
Plinth
Corridor crypt surronding the apse of an early medieval church, often associated with chambers for relics
Ring crypt
A cheaper substitute for stucco, usually with a grainy texture
Cement
Subsidiary street or lane, often running into a main street
Wynd (Scots)
In Gothic architecture, leafy hooks or knobs decorating the edges of pinnacles, canopies, etc
Crockets
An ornamented or painted feature above a fireplace
Overmantel
An especially tall or elaborate pew for use by the churchwarden, usually placed at the west end of a church
Churchwarden’s pew
A buttress set diagonally to the angle
Diagonal buttress or French buttress
Outer curved face of an arch or vault
Extrados
Refers to buildings using local materials in traditional ways, designed without the intervention of architects
Vernacular (compare Neo-vernacular)
Rectangular section cut out of a masonry edge to receive a shutter, door, window, etc.
Rebate
Reuse of a surface. Of a brass: where a metal plate has been reused by turning over and engraving on the back. Of a wall painting: where one overlaps and partly obscures an earlier one
Palimpsest
Roman public hall; hence an aisled building, especially a church, with a clerestory (windows in the walls rising over the aisles)
Basilica
A pediment with a segmental (part-circular) top
Segmental pediment or arch pediment
The latest phase of French Gothic architecture, with flowing tracery
Flamboyant
A feature in garden design in which three radiating avenues focus on a single point; derived from French Baroque layouts
Patte d’oie
A small temple-like buildinig, usually round and domed
Tempietto
Female fertility figure, usually with legs apart
Sheila-na-gig
Classical running ornament of curly waves
Vitruvian scroll
A dark limestone from this peninsula in Dorset, which can be polished; used especially in the first two centuries of English Gothic architecture
Purbeck
Lead strips joining pieces of window glass (image: dark-coloured C and H pieces)
Cames
Course of stones, or equivalent, on top of a cornice and crowning the wall
Blocking course
Monochrome painting, especially on walls or glass
Grisaille
Columns with twisted spiral shafts
Salomonic or barley-sugar columns
Sharp groove to one side of a convex medieval moulding
Quirk
Enclosed vestibule or covered porch at the main entrance to a church
Narthex
Fence or wall made from wooden stakes or tree trunks and used as a defensive structure.
Palisade or stakewall
In churches, a shelf within or beside a piscina, or a table for the sacramental elements and vessels
Credence
Regular openings in a parapet that fulfil a defensive function
Crenels
Squared stones set like steps, e.g. on a gable.
Crowsteps or Corbiesteps (Scotland)
Flat slab forming the top of a capital on a column or pilaster.
Abacus
A timber roof with close-set braces of polygonal or curved profile, often ceiled between the timbers
Wagon roof or cradle roof
Large-paned glazing with minimal framing, developed in the 20th century
Patent glazing
Loosely, seating for the laity outside the chancel; strictly, an enclosed seat
Pew
Two-cylinder steam engine
Compound
An unglazed slit window
Loophole (compare arrow loop)
Masonry whose stones are wholly or partly in a rough state
Rubble
Underground or half-underground area, usually below the east end of a church
Crypt
Brickwork pattern similar to the Flemish bond but consisting of rowlocks and shiners instead of headers and stretchers. This gives a wall with an internal cavity bridged by the rowlocks
Rat-trap bond
Cornice overhanging the edge of a roof
Eaves cornice
A brick laid with its short end exposed
Header
In a church, the central space at the junction of the nave, chancel and transepts
Crossing
A pyramidal roof set diagonally on a tower, so that it meets the walls by means of gables
Helm roof or Rhenish helm
A pattern of chequered squares made with contrasting materials
Chequerwork
Inscription on a tomb or monument
Epitaph
Oval with pointed ends
Vesica
The poorer kind of bricks, used on internal or concealed construction
Place bricks
Three-cylinder steam engine
Triple expansion
Divided into apartments
Flatted
Horizontal longitudinal timber at the apex of a roof, supporting the ends of the rafters
Ridge or ridge-piece
Formal urban open space surrounded by buildings
Piazza
Variation of the broach spire, in which the four cardinal faces are splayed out near their bases, to cover the corners, while oblique (or intermediate) faces taper away to a point
Splayed-foot spire
Projecting string-course on a doocot (dovecote) to deter rats
Ratcourse (Scots)
Post-Roman and Norman defence consisting of an earthen mound topped by a wooden tower within an enclosure defended by a ditch and palisade, and also, sometimes, by an internal bank
Motte-and-bailey (motte=earthen mound, bailey=enclosure defended by a ditch and palisade)
Of five or more storeys
Multi-storey
Paired vertical or near-vertical timbers place symmetrically on a tie-beam of a roof to support purlins (horizontal longitudinal timbers)
Queenposts
A mound or bank of earth, used especially as a barrier or to provide insulation.Also the flat space between the edge of a ditch and the base of a fortification.
Berm
Pairs of inclined timbers (blades), usually curved, set at bay-length intervals in a building; they support the roof timbers and, in timber buildings, also support the walls
Crucks
Drainage stone designed to carry kitchen waste through the thickness of a wall
Slop stone (Irish)
Compact fortified house with the main hall raised above the ground and at least one more storey above it. The type continued well into the 17th century in its modified froms: L-plan, with a jamb or wing at one coner; Z-plan, with a jamb or wing at each diagonally oppostie corner
Tower house (Scots and Irish)
Timber-framed construction in which vertical and horizontal members support the roof. Also concrete construction in which the loads are taken on cross-walls
Box frame or cross-wall construction
Raised and enclosed platform for the preaching of sermons
Pulpit
One of the orders of classical architecture, distinguished in particular by downward- and inward-curling spirals (called volutes) on the capital of the column
Ionic
Projecting end stones for bonding with an adjoining wall
Tusking stones (Scots)
Of panelling, with the central area of the panel raised up. Also used for stonework treated with sunk or raised panels
Raised and fielded
Braced framework, spanning between supports
Truss
Subsidiary vertical timbers of a timber-framed wall or partition (image: number 5)
Studs
Wall for protection at any sudden drop, e.g. on a bridge, or at the wall-head of a castle where it protects the parapet walk or wall-walk. Also used to conceal a roof
Parapet
A gable with curved sides crowned by a pediment
Flemish or Dutch gable
Vane or indicator casting a shadow onto a sundial
Gnomon
A style of 18-th century decoraton characterized by asymmetrical ornament, often in C- or S-shapes usually derived from foliage or shells. It began in France, flourishing most fully there and in Germany and Central Europe. It is sometimes associated with the imitation Chinese manner known as Chinoiserie, and, in the British Isles, with the phase of the Gothic Revival known as Gothick
Rococo
Short decorative ribs in the upper part of a vault, not linked to any springing point
Liernes (hence Lierne vault)
Decoration in relief simulating woven or entwined stems or bands
Interlace
Transverse portion of a church
Transept
Medieval moulding of semicircular or more than semi-circular section
Roll moulding
A trench or open drain; a street gutter
Sheugh (Scots)
The better kind of bricks, used for outward facing. Also the yellowish kind of bricks much used in and around London
(London) Stock bricks
In a roof, a short timber placed on the back and at the foot of a rafter to form projecting eaves
Sprocket or coyau
A chimneystack
Stack
In tracery, an elongated ogee-ended lozenge shape
Dagger
Wheel with water fed on to it over the top
Overshot water wheel
Brickwork with only the short ends of the brick exposed
Header bond
A gallery in a church reserved for a special group
Trades loft (compare laird’s loft)
Level space in a garden laid out with low, formal beds of plants
Parterre
A building from which alms are delivered to the poor.
Almonry
Three-centred and depressed arch, or one with a flat centre
Basket arch or anse de panier
Residence of Buddhist monks or nuns
Sangha
In an altarpiece, the horizontal strip below the main representation, often used for subsidiary representations
Predella
Coffin of stone or other durable material
Sarcophagus (lit. flesh-consuming)
A tall block carrying a classical column, statue, vase, etc.
Pedestal
Vehicle and pedestrian segregation in rsidential developments, based on that used at this city in New Jersey, USA, by Wright and Stein in 1928-30
Radburn system
Hinged part of a lifting bridge
Bascule
Influential type of Roman Imperial monument, free.standing, with a square attic or top section and broad sections to either side of the main opening, often with lesser openings or columns
Triumphal arch
Shaft leading up to the spring or springing of a vault
Vaulting shaft
A broad tapering leaf shape that turns over at the top, used especially on late 12th-century capitals and some classical mouldings
Waterleaf (hence waterleaf capital)
Repetitive surface decoration of lozenges or squares flat or in relief. Achieved in brickwork with bricks of two colours
Diaper
Arch joining a church tower to the nave
Tower arch
A type of timber construction in which curving paired members (blades) rise from ground level to the apex of the roof, serving as the main elements of a roof truss
Full cruck
Two-dimensional representation of a building, moulding etc., revealed by cutting across it
Section
Of a hillfort: defended by three or more concentric banks and ditches
Multivallate
A three-dimensional framework in which all the members are interconnected, designed to cover very large areas
Space frame
In 20th-century and later architecture, a visually distinct topmost storey or storeys
Hamper
Central stone upright supporting the tympanum of a wide doorway, especially of a medieval church
Trumeau
Form of pointing that is flush at the edges and gently recessed in the middle
Bag-rubbed pointing
Type of thorough purlin which rests on queenposts or is carried in the angle between principals and collar
Clasped purlins
Architectural surround, consisting usually of two columns or pilasters supporting a pediment.
Aedicule
A symbolic figure in the form of a three-cornered knot of interlaced arcs, common in Celtic art
Triquetra
Porch large enough to admit wheeled vehicles
Porte cochère
Inclined, projecting surface to keep water away from the wall below.
Set-off or weathering
Horizontal moulding at the springing of an arch (image: number 2)
Impost
House of a minister of religion
Manse
A form of capital shaped like an upturned bell, common in early medieval architecture
Bell capital
Table used in Protestant churches for the celebration of Holy Communion
Communion table
Horizontal part of a step
Tread
A brick laid with its short end exposed and burnt to a darker shade, usually producing a patterned effect
Flared header
Of masonry, hacked or picked as a key for rendering; used as a surface finish in the 19th century
Stugged (Scots)
A reveal, i.e. the plane of a jamb between the wall and the frame of a door or window
Scuntion (Scots)
Side-hinged window
Casement
Projecting horizontal moulding above an arch or lintel to throw off water
Label or hoodmould
Horizontal transverse roof-timber connecting a pair of rafters or cruck blades, set between the apex and the wall-plate
Collar or collar-beam
Brickwork with one course of headers (short ends) for every three or more couses of stretchers (long sides)
English garden wall bond
Bay window that rests on corbels or brackets and starts above ground level; also the bay window at the upper or dais end of a medieval great hall
Oriel
Squared stones, usually of granite, used for paving or flooring
Setts
Painted or carved panel standing on or at the back of an altar, usually attached to it
Retable
Synthetic resin reinforced with glass fibre
Fibreglass, glass-reinforced polyester (GRP) or glass-reinforced concrete (GRC)
The carved decoration of certain classical mouldings
Enrichments
Paired vertical or near-vertical timbers placed symmetrically on a tie-beam of a roo f to support the rafters, and not directly attached to the longitudinal timbers
Queen-struts
The main body or enclosure of a classical temple, as distinct from the portico
Cella or naos
An isolated section of entablature above a column or pilaster
Dosseret
A upper room or floor, especially within a roof space; also, a gallery in a church
Loft
Plain horizontal band, e.g. in an architrave, or on a shopfront (image: metallic silver vertically oriented surface with two “lines”)
Fascia
Moulding used form the late 12th century, in section like the keel of a ship
Keel moulding
A stair rising in one flight and returning at right angles in two
Imperial stair
Protective course of masonry or brickwork capping a wall
Coping
A tomb-chest with effigies beneath a flat canopy (tester) attached to a wall, with columns on one side only
Half-tester
Manner introduced to Britain by Inigo Jones in the early 17th century, and revived by Lord Burlington and others in the 18th century, in both cases a counter to the less strict or pure styles of the day. Its influence continued well into the 19th century
Palladian
Brickwork pattern separating courses of alternately laid stretchers and headers, with a number of courses of stretchers alone
Flemish stretcher bond
The English version of the Romanesque style, which predominated in Western Europe in the 11th and 12th centuries. It is associated especially with the expansion of monasticism and the building of large stone churches, and is characterized by massive masonry, round-headed arches and vaulting inspired by ancient Roman precedent, and by the use of stylized ornament
Norman
Wall cladding of overlapping horizontal boards
Clapboarding or weatherboarding
Gable with kneelers
Kneelered gable
Sharp edge at the meeting of two compartments (cells) of a groin-vault
Groin
Used for the area around the main altar of a church
Sanctuary
Chimney rising from a wallhead
Wallhead chimney
A terminal to a hoodmould or label (projecting moulding above an arch or lintel) carved wiht a head
Headstop
An engaged column half of whose circumference projects from the wall
Demi- or half-column
Chapel or vestibule usually at the west end of a church and enclosing the main entrances
Galilee
The front features of a portico applied to a wall
Blind portico
Defensive parapet, composed of merlons (solid) and crenels or crenelles (embrasures or openings) through which archers could shoot
Battlement or crenellation
Used to describe a compound feature, e.g. an entablature, with some elements omitted or combined
Elided
A row of rooms two deep
Double pile
The conscious revival of Greek classical architecture, as distinct from its later, Roman forms. At its peak in the early 19th century, its origins can be traced to the middle of the century before
Greek revival
A tendency within classical architecture, at its peak in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, which aimed at a purer imitation of the buildings of the Greeks and Romans, or at a more logical and rigorous use of the elements of the classical style
Neo-Classicism
Pattern of brickwork with three stretchers between every header and the headers centred above the midpoint of three stretchers in the course below
Sussex bond
In a timber-framed building, a beam set diagonally at the corner to carry the joists where two jetties or projecting storeys meet
Dragon beam
A projecting window of curved plan
Bow window
Subsidiary space alongside the body of a building, separated from it by columns, piers or posts
Aisle
Bay window with a straight front and angled sides
Canted bay window
Steam engine with a large pivoted beam moving in an oscillating fahion by the flywheel. It may drive a flywheel or be non-rotative
Beam engine
A part-spherical structure of lightweight rods, joined in an even three-dimensional frame ((called a space-frame) developed by the American engineer R. Buckminster Fuller
Geodesic dome
An enclosed quadrangle in a monastery of by a church, surrounded by covered passages; by extension, any space so enclosed.
Cloister
Low wall between the choir and nave of a church
Septum
Garden wall undulating in a series of serpentine curves
Crinkle-crankle wall
Sunk chamber with access from above through a hatch
Pit prison (Scots)
Classical ornament like a symmetrical palm shoot
Palmette
A stair with one or more flights unsupported by a wall on either side
Flying stair
Dripstone over an opening
Hoodmould or hood mould
In classical architecture, a large semicircular or polygonal recess
Exedra or apse
Cusping in which the sides of the cusps have smaller cusps in turn
Sub-cusping
Bar tracery with uninterrupted flowing curves, typical of the 14th century
Flowing tracery (flamboyant tracery?) or curvilinear tracery
Pew enclosed by a high wooden back and ends, the latter having doors
Box pew
Roof truss incorporated in the spere
Spere truss
In a roof, a pair of inclined lateral timbers or rafters of a truss. Usually the support horizontal side timbers called purlins, and mark the main bay divisions
Principals
One of a series of defensive semicircular or polygonal projections from the main wall of a fortress or city
Bastion
Ornament in the form of long trailing ribbons, common in Elizabethan and Jacobean times
Ribbonwork
Thin pieces of wood like overlapping tiles, used externally
Shingles
Home farm on an estate
Mains (Scots)
Soft brick sawn roughly, then rubbed to a precise (gauged) surface. Mostly used for door or window openings
Rubbed brickwork or gauged brickwork
Under-surface of an arch, or a moulded band following its contour.
Archivolt
The simplest and plainest of the three main classical orders, featuring a frieze with triglyphs and metopes.
Doric
Vaulted chamber, with embrasures for defence, within a castle wall or projecting from it
Casemate
An arch with arcs in each corner joining straight lines to the central point
Tudor arch (depressed arch, four-centred arch?)
A generic term for any very high multi-storey building
Tower block
Big horizontal beam supporting the wall above, especially a jetty or projecting storey
Bressummer (or bresummer?)
A broad concave moulding, e.g. to mask the eaves of a roof
Cove
A style which originated at the Eastern capital of the Roman Empire, in the 5th century. It developed the round arches, vaults and domes of Roman architecture but eschewed formalized classical detail in favour of lavish decoration and ornament of emblematic and symbolic significance. Introduced to late 19th- and early 20th- century Britain as an alternative to Gothic, usually for church architecture
Byzantine
Of concrete: incorporating steel rods to take the tensile force
Reinforced
Funerary monument which is not a burying place
Cenotaph (lit. empty tomb)
English Gothic architecture c. 1240-1290. During this period the French invention of bar tracery allowed for larger windows subdivided by stone mullions and tracery, in place of the single lancets of the Early English style. This is the earliest kind of bar tracery, i.e. with patterns formed by intersectiong moulded ribwork continuing upwards from the mullions, using simple forms, especially circles, chiefly foiled
Geometrical tracery
A sloping member holding the ends of the treads and risers of a staircase
String, stringer or stringer board
Sharp edge where two surfaces meet at an angle.
Arris
Pulpit with reading desk below
Two-decker pulpit
A term adopted from painting and sculpture for a tendency within Modernist architecture from the 1980s onwards towards simple forms and volumens, typified by the all-white interior
Minimalism
Painting on dry plaster
Fresco secco, a fresco or fresco finto
Of concrete, textured with steel bushes or brushes after casting
Brushed or bush-hammered
Vertical strips of brickwork, often in a contrasting colour, linking openings on different floors
Laced brickwork
Ogival arch that curves forward from the wall face at the top
Nodding ogee
The part of the cathedral, monastic church or collegiate church where services are sung
Choir
Farm building or buildings, most often the principal group of agricultural buildings on a farm
Steading (Scots)
A bridge carrying a towing path from one bank to the other
Roving bridge
Method of construction in which the structural frame is buildt of interlocking timbers
Timber framing
A stair in a rectangular compartment with a central supporting newel
Winder stair
The lower courses of a vault or arch which are laid horizontally (image: arch C)
Tas-de-charge
Classical orders on successive levels, customarily in the upward sequence of Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, Composite
Superimposed orders
A window with a glazed section or section that opens by sliding in grooves
Sash window
Of a hill-fort: defended by one concentric bank and ditch
Univallate
A version of the simplest and plainest of the three main classical orders, featuring a frieze with tryglyphs and metopes. The columns in this style have a thin spreading convex capital and no base to the column
Greek Doric
A bracket at the bottom end of a skew
Skewputt (Scots)
Massive stone-built Neolithic burial chamber covered by an earth or stone mound
Megalithic tomb
Of a porch or portico: with four columns across the front
Tetrastyle
es: Tetrástilo
fr: Tétrastyle
nl: Tetrastyl
A stair that ascends roound a central supporting newel
Newel stair or turnpike stair
In an older house or college, a screened-off entrance passage between great hall and service rooms
Screens passage
A flat circular ornament in the shape of a flower
Rosette
In a church, an arch dividing chancel from nave or crossing
Chancel arch
The junction between a chamfer and a straight edge
Chamferstop
Structural frame in which the main uprights (posts) and horizontals (rails) form large square or near-square compartments
Square panel
A garland or festoon of stylized nutshells
Husk garland
A portico with eight columns
Octostyle portico
Manufacture of buildings or components off-site for assembly on-site
Prefabrication
Enriched area of roof above a rood or altar
Celure or ceilure
The style of early 17-century England, called after the king who reigned between 1603-25, but common into the middle decades. Not always distinguishable form the preceding Elizabethan manner, with which it shares a fondness for densely applied classical ornament and symmetrical gabled façades
Jacobean (after James I)
A predetermined standard size for co-ordinating the dimensions of components of a building. In classical architecture, it is usually a multiple or fraction of the width of the order or type of column used
Module
Ox skull used decoratively in friezes on classical buildings, especially those of the Doric order
Bucranium (pl: bucrania)
Paired braces crossing diagonally between pairs of rafters or principals
Scissor braces
Roof tile of curved S-shaped section
Pantile
Composition flooring of Roman origin
Opus signinum
Masonry cleft to produce a natural, rugged appearance
Rock-faced
In classical architecture and decoration, a band of geometrical ornament composed of straight and vertical lines
Key pattern, Greek fret of Greek key
Turret corbelled out from the wall
Tourelle
Early railway using plate rails, i.e. rails of L-section
Plateway
Capital with concave lower part, usually scalloped, in use in the later 12th century
Trumpet capital
Safe cupboard in a side wall of the chancel of a church and not directly associated with an altar, for reservation of the sacrament
Sacrament house
A buttress placed slightly back from the angle of a building
Set-back buttress
The main building(s) as distinct from the wings or pavilions
Corps-de-logis
Archaic term for timber framing. Sometimes used for non-structural decorative timberwork
Half-timbering
An early phase of the Gothic Revival, at its peak c. 1730-80, marked by thin, delicate forms used without much concern for archaeological accuracy or structural logic
Gothick
Thin, self-supporting roofing membrane of timber or concrete
Shell
A broken pediment with double-curved sides
Swan-neck pediment
A container at the top of a downpipe, usually of lead, into which rainwater runs from the gutters
Rainwater-head
The most slender and ornate of the three main classical orders. It has a basket-shaped capital ornamented with acanthus foliage
Corinthian
A long avenue defined by two parallel earthen banks with ditches outside
Cursus
A pier composed of grouped shafts, or a solid core surrounded by shafts
Compound pier or cluster pier
A wide segmental truss built as a lattice-beam, originally using short cuts of timber left over from shipbuiding
Belfast truss
Hammer-dressed stonework with a pocked appearance, characteristic of Irish masonry from the 14th to the 16th centuries
Pocked tooling
Dressed stones at the edges of an opening
Margins or rybats (chiefly Scots)
A medieval toilet; usually built into the thickness of an external wall
Garderobe
Free-standing upright member of any section, not conforming to one of the classical orders
Pillar
Tower together with a spire, lantern, or belfry
Steeple
A small column or shaft, usually medieval
Colonnette
A form of wall covering in which pebbles or gravel are thrown at the wet plaster for a textured effect
Pebbledash or roughcast
A form of rustication with a stylized texture like worm-casts
Vermiculation
Of a roof: with longitudinal members such as purlins above the springing of the rafters
Double-framed
Used generally for the late Georgian architecture of 1800-30, which favoured thiinner or more summary classical detail than the 18th-century norm
Regency
Dressed or otherwise emphasized stones at the angles of a building, or their imitation in brick or other materials
Quoins
A tendency within Modernist architecture of the later 1950s to 1970s marked by the display of rough or unfinished concrete, large massive forms, and abrupt juxtapositions
Brutalism
Small defensible tower or tower-house of stone, especiallly near the Scottish-English border
Peel tower or pele tower
Square blocks attached to the underside of a Doric cornice, in line with the triglyphs
Mutules
A painting or carving above or behind an altar.
Altarpiece
Balmoral Castle
Aberdeenshire (UK)
1856
William Smith, directed by Prince Albert
Scottish Baronial style
Screen that was placed below a representation of the Crucifixion
Rood screen
In timber-framed construction, the non-structural material that fills the compartments ,e.g. wattle and daub, lath and plaster, brickwork (known as nogging) etc
Infill
(lit. corner-break) Surface formed by cutting off a square edge or corner
Chamfer
Brickwork pattern with two stretchers between every header with the headers centred over the perpend between the two stretchers in the course below in the bond’s most symmetric form
Monk bond
Bar tracery with even upright divisions made by a horizontal transom or transoms
Panel tracery
Open inner court of a house, especially a Roman house; in a multi-storey building, a toplit covered through all storeys.
Atrium (plural: atria)
In a timber-roof, paired braces crossing diagonally between pairs of rafters or principals
Scissor-braces
An exchange or market house
Tholsel (Irish), tolsey
An arch incorporated in a wall to relieve superimposed weight
Relieving arch or discharging arch
Decorative building terminating a vista
Eyecatcher
Low bank on the downhill or outer side of a hillfort ditch
Counterscarp bank
With liernes (short decorative ribs not linked to any springing point) in star formation
Star-vault or stellar vault
Half-pier or half-colummn bonded into a wall and carrying one end of an arch. It usually terminates an arcade
Respond
Rigid frame spanning a space or opening
Truss
Recess for a hearth with provision for seating
Inglenook
Small gateway at the back of a building, especially a castle or gatehouse, or to the side of a larger entrance door or gate
Postern
Churchyard cross with lantern-shaped top
Lantern cross
Lofty pillar of square section, tapering at the top and ending pyramidically
Obelisk
Stage in a tower where the bell ringers stand
Ringing chamber
With parallel flights rising alternately in opposite directions without an open well
Dog-leg stair or scale-and-platt stair (Scots, lit. stair and landing)
Brickwork pattern with alternating stretching and heading courses. However, whilst the heading courses are identical with those found in the standard English bond, the stretching courses alternate between a course composed entirely of stretchers from quoin to quoin with no off-set, and a course composed of stretchers half off-set relative to the stretchers two courses above or below, by virtue of a header placed just before the quoins at either end
English Cross bond
Plain or decorated terminal to mouldings or chamfers at the end of hoodmoulds and labels or stringcourses
Stop
A chapel, often attached to or within a church, endowed for the celebration of masses principally for the soul of the founder(s)
Chantry chapel
Artificial cavern
Grotto
Of classical columns, set between pilasters or square columns of equal height, often within a portico
In antis
Of a roof: without purlins or other longitudinal members above the springing of the rafters
Single-framed
Flat plain horizontal course or moulding between storeys
Platband
Seats for the priests (usually three) in the wall on the south side of the chancel of a church or chapel
Sedilia (singular: sedile)
Burial mound
Barrow or tumulus
Ornamental garland, shown as if suspended from both ends
Festoon (compare swag)
Roman heating system in which hot air was circulated under the floors
Hypocaust (lit. underburning)
Stair with flights round a square open well framed by newel posts
Well stair
A form of rustication treated like icicles or stalactites
Frost-work or glaciation
Chapels projecting radially from an ambyuatory or apse, usually at the east end of a large church
Radiating chapels
A stair cantilevered from the walls of the stairwell, without newels
Geometrical stair
Horizontal course or moulding projecting from the surface or a wall
String course
Private upper chamber in a medieval house, accessible from the high or dais end of the great hall
Solar
A multi-storey block with flats approached from corridors or galleries from service cores at intervals or towers at the ends (plan also used for offices, hotels etc.)
Slab block
The surface between a lintel and the arch above it, or within a pediment
Tympanum
Stair from the dormitory into the transept of an abbey or monastery church, used for entry to celebrate night services
Night stair
A single-storey frame used from the 20th century, comprising two uprights rigidly connected to a beam or pair of rafters, particularly to support a roof
Portal frame
The covering of outside walls with a uniform surface or skin for protection from the weather
Rendering
A monument attached to the wall and often standing on the floor
Wall monument (compare tablet or wall tablets)
Temporary framing of timber or metal used for casting concrete
Shuttering or formwork
Structure protecting an entrance
Fore-building
A symbolic figure in the form of a three-cornered knot of interlaced arcs, common in Celtic art
Triquetra (compare terquetra)
In a monument, an effigy depicted as a corpse
Gisant or cadaver (compare transi)
Gate constructed to rise and fall in vertical grooves at the entry to a castle
Portcullis
Compartment of a window defined by the uprights or mullions
Light
Of concrete, cast in position on the building
In situ
The upright part of a pedestal, i.e. between base and cornice
Die
Shaft set in the angle of a wall or opening
Nook-shaft
The stronger modern equivalent of wrought iron
Mild steel
Mourning figures in niches along the sides of some medieval tombs
Weepers
Conical roof of a turret
Candle-snuffer roof
Classical ornament of interlaced bands
Guilloche
A roof with a small gable at the top of a hip roof
Gablet
A three-lobed opening
Trefoil
A rib set against the wall in a rib-vault
Wall-rib
A portico with two columns
Distyle portico
A six-lobed opening
Sexfoil
Mosaic flooring, particularly Roman, made of small cubes of glass, stone or brick
Tessellated pavement
A simplified style developed in early 19th-century Germany, drawing on Early Christian, Byzantine, Romanesque and early Renaissance precedents
Rundbogenstil
A mortar bed for verge slates laid over the gable skew
Tifting
A segmental or shallow triangular gable treated as a pediment, i.e. with classical mouldings along the top
Pedimental gable
A portico with free-standing columns
Prostyle portico
Archway in medieval architecture formed across the wide inner opening of a window
Rere-arch
A side window set lower than the others in the chancel of a church, usually towards its west end
Lowside window
Of a timber-framed wall: with closely set studs or vertical timbers of equal size
Close studding
A bridge with the roadway suspended from cables or chains slung between towers or pylons
Suspension bridge
Series of corbels to carry a parapet or a wall-plate or wall-post
Corbel table
Of an opening: wider on one face of the wall than the other
Splayed
Of joists on a ceiling divided by beams into compartments, when placed in opposite directions in alternate squares
Counterchanging
Glass fiber reinforced concrete
GRC or GFRC
es: Concreto reforzado con vidrio
fr: Composite ciment verre (CCV)
Tomb-chest used for Easter ceremonial, within or against the north wall of a chancel of a church or chapel
Easter sculpture
A step on a curved or turning section of a stair
Winder
Ductile iron that is strong in tension, forged into decorative patterns or forged and rolled into e.g. bars, joists, boiler plates
Wrought iron
In classical architecture, a window with an arched central light flanked by two lower straight-headed ones; the motif is also used for other openings
Palladian window, serlian window, serlian motif, serliana or venetian window
Pulpit with reading desk below and clerk’s desk below that
Three-decker pulpit
A tendency within (especially) 20th-century architecture, at its strongest since the 1970s, which seeks to evoke local traditions of building, usually in pursuit of a friendly, domestic image
Neo-Vernacular
An open area used for jousting (image: below, right)
Tiltyard
The central flat area within panelling, often slightly projecting
Field
A passage, especially a screens passage, i.e. a screened-off entrance passage between great hall and service rooms in an older house or college
Transe
Market
Mercat (Scots)
A rib spanning between two walls to divide a rib-vault into bays
Transverse rib
Earthenwave tiles fired with a pattern and glaze
Encaustic tiles (the validity of this term is disputed)
Device to secure corpses: either in an iron frame over a grave or a building where bodies were kept during decomposition
Mort-safe (Scots)
String cut into the shape of the treads and risers
Open string
Projecting water spout often carved into human or animal shape
Gargoyle
A cross with arms set diagonally
Saltire cross
A bridge with one long stone forming the roadway
Clapper bridge
The single most important new style or philosophy of desing of the 20th century, associated with the elimination of ornament, a strictly rational use of (often new) materials and an openness to structural innovation, and an analytical approach to the function of buildings
Modernism
A non-load-bearing external wall applied to a framed structure, in architecture of the 20th century onwards. Also a connecting wall between the towers of a castle
Curtain wall
Metal window grid to which glazing, especially stained glass, is secured
Ferramenta
A chapel in the position of a transept and opening to the nave through a single arch, but without a full central crossing
Transeptal chapel
Close or walled garden
Pleasance (Scots)
An early type of keep or principal tower in a castle, of rectangular plan, containing the great hall and chief bedchamber
Hall-keep
A hard, durable white limestone from the isle of the same name in Dorset
Portland stone
Room in an abbey or monastery where a fire burned for comfort
Warming room or calefactory
In a medieval church, usually set at the entry to the chancel
Screen
Horizontal projecting stone at the base of each sde of a gable to support the inclined coping stones.
Kneeler
Horizontal longitudinal timbers in a roof structure which pass through or past the principals
Through purlins
One of the vertical sides of an opening
Jamb
Gable above a dormer, often formed as a pediment
Dormer head
A walk along the wall-head of a castle, protected by a parapet
Chemin de ronde, wall-walk or parapet walk
Moulded foot of a column or pilaster
Base
The style of the first Christian churches of the 4th and 5th centuries. As revived in 20th-century churches, it favours simplified arcades and round-arched openings, plain surfaces and tiled roofs
Early Christian
A gabled roof with a sloped end to the upper part only
Half-hipped roof
Brickwork pattern consistinig entirely of stretchers, but with the bricks in every other course staggering in some pattern other than the standard
Vertical or oblique timber between two members of a truss, not directly supporting longitudinal timbers
Strut
The plane of a jamb, between the wall and the frame of a door or window
Reveal
Lock-up booth or shop
Luckenbooth (Scots)
A fixed canopy over an altar, usually vaulted and supported on four columns. Also a canopied shrine for the reserved sacrament.
Ciborium or baldachinno
Central stone in an arch or vault
Keystone
A double curve, bending first one way and then the other
Ogee
A church endowed for the support of a college of priests
Collegiate church
Generally used for the period c.1175-1200, between Norman and the first (Early English) period of Gothic, in which details of the later style are often used on the general forms of the earlier
Transitional
Dependent structurally on the arch principle.
Arcuated
A geometrical ornament composed of a repeating pattern of horizontal and vertical lines or strips
Fret or meander
A large beam
Girder
Flat baluster with shaped sides
Splat baluster
Division of a church designed to house the font; also a separate building for the same purpose
Baptistery
Farm owned and run by a religious order
Grange
Female figures supporting an entablature
Caryatids
A heraldic pun, e.g. a fiery cock for Cockburn
Rebus or canting arms
Accurate detailed use of a revived style.
Archaeological
Brick or stone joints without pointing (exposed mortar), or deeply recessed to show the outline of each stone
Hungry joints
Level at which an arch or vault rises from its supports
Spring or springing
Arrangement of sunken panels, square or polygonal, decorating a ceiling, vault or arch
Coffering
Pattern of brickwork with one stretcher between headers, and each header centred over the stretchers in the course below
Flemish bond
Descriptive of two figures placed back to back.
Addorsed
Tax office containing burgh council chamber and prison
Tolbooth (Scots; lit tax booth)
Horizontal reinforcement in timber or brick to walls of flint, cobble, etc
Lacing course
Large masonry or brick support, often for an arch
Pier
Vertical face of a step
Riser
Bond that comprises a complex pattern of stretcher courses alternating with courses of one or two stretchers between headers, at various offsets such that over ten courses a diamond-shaped pattern appears
Flemish Diagonal bond (form of diapering)
In medieval churches, a blind arcade forming a dado below windows
Wall arcade
Rustication with the faces treated like shallow pyramids
Diamond-faced rustication
Central roof-timber which carries collar-beams and is supported by crown-posts
Collar purlin or crown-plate
In a greater medieval church, a covered way or passage leading east from the cloisters between transept and chapter house
Slype
Architectural structure built against or projecting from a wall which serves to support or reinforce the wall.They are fairly common on more ancient buildings, as a means of providing support to act against the lateral (sideways) forces arising out of the roof structures that lack adequate bracing.
Buttress (fr: contrefort/ d: Strebewerk/ n: steunbeer)
IN 16th- and 17-century buildings, the central feature of doorway and windows above linked in one composition
Frontispiece
A single sloping roof built against a vertical wall; also applied to the part of the building beneath
Lean-to
A thin spire rising from the centre of a tower roof, well inside the parapet
Needle spire
Cusp with a v-shaped opening set within the apex
Kentish or split cusp
Term used more often for late Gothic secular buildings especially of the first half of the 16th century. These use a simplified version of Perpendicular, characterised by straight-headed mullioned windows with arched lights, and by rooflines with steep gables and tall chimneys, often asymmetrically placed
Tudor
In an abbey or monastery, a washing place adjacent to the refectory or dining hall
Lavatorium
A deeply recessed surface, formed by cutting into a square edge or corner
Sunk chamfer
A much-debated cultural label, used in the architectural world since the 1970s to denote the reuse of motifs from historical stules, in contexts where a Modernist approach would have omitted them
Postmodernism
A chamber with gates at each end allowing boats to float from one level to another. Successor to the flash lock
Pound lock
The lowest stones of an arch or vaulting rib
Springers
Tracery applied to a solid wall
Blind tracery
Latrines in a monastery or abbey, usually placed east of the cloister
Reredorter (lit. behind the dormitory)
A circular painting or relief
Tondo
- A strip of wood or metal separating and holding panes of glass in a window.
- A vertical framing member set between two rails in a door or in paneling
Muntin
Central or corner post of a staircase
Newel
New Stone Age (c.3500 B.C-c.2000 B.C)
Neolithic
A series of arches supported by piers or columns, applied to the wall surface
Blind arcade
Longitudinal member of a timber-framed building, set square to the ground (image: numbers 3 and 6)
Plate
Flat canopy over a pultpit
Sounding-board or tester
Ornamental building for occasional use in a garden, park, etc.; or a projecting subdivision of a larger building, often at an angle or terminating a wing
Pavilion
Used for V-shapes in series or (later) double series on a moulding in Norman architecture, especially when on a single plane
Zigzag or chevron
Regularly spaced unifom rafters placed along the length of the roof, or between principals
Common rafter or coupled rafter
Wall covering of a thin layer of lime plaster
Limewashing
Brickwork pattern made of four bricks surrounding a square brick, one-quarter the size of a half-brick
Della Robbia bond
Crucifix flanked by the Virgin and St Johs, usually over the entry into the chancel, set on a beam (rood beam) or painted on the wall
Rood cross
A balustrade applied to the wall surface
Blind balustrade
The English architecture of the later 16th century, marked by a decorative use of Renaissance ornament and a preference for symmetry
Elizabethan
Openwork pattern of masonry or timber in an opening, especially the upper part of an opening; most common in Gothic architecture
Tracery
The use of large stones, singly or together
Megalithic
A pitched roof used on a tower
Saddleback roof
The part of a church lying east of the choir where the main altar is placed. Also a priest’s residence
Presbytery
A lozenge-shaped panel painted with armorial bearings, used in funeral ceremonies and often afterwards displayed in a church
Hatchment
A formalized gable derived from that of a classical temple; also used over doors, windows, etc
Pediment
An aperture in a wall or through a pier in a church or chapel, usually to allow a view of an altar
Hagioscope or squint
Square (or diamond) panes of glass supported by lead strips (cames), Also square floor slabs or tiles
Quarries
Slender spire on the ridge of a roof
Spirelet or fleche
In joinery, the meeting of two members of identical section at a diagonal
Mitre joint (UK) or miter joint (USA)
Multi-storey flats with the individual flats arranged around a service core
Cluster block.
A pilaster without base or capital
Lesene or pilaster strip
A form of block capital in which the convex lower faces are carved with broad flutings or half-cones
Scalloped capital
A form of timber-framed wall in which the main uprights (posts) and horizontals (rails) form large square or near-square compartments.
Square panel
Of flint, worked to a flat outer surface
Knapped
A portico with four columns
Tetrastyle portico
External stair, usually unenclosed
Forestair
Longitudinal timber on top of a wall, which receivees the ends of the rafters
Wall-plate (compare purlin)
(Scots) A triangular or wedge-shaped piece of land, or the corner building on such a site
Gushet
Gable rising from a wallhead
Wallhead gable
Canopied structure in a church or chapel to contain the reserved sacrament or a relic. Also an architectural frame for an image or statue
Tabernacle
A private chapel in a church or house. Also a church of the Oratorians (Roman Catholic)
Oratory
Intentional inward inclination of a wall face
Batter
Circular or near-circular enclosure consisting of one or more earthen (or occasionally stone) banks, classified according to the number of surrounding ditches as univallate, bivallate or trivallate. Most date from early Christian times and housed single farms or served as cattle enclosures for farms
Ring fort or rath (Irish)
A suspension bridge supported by diagonal stays from towers or pylons
Stay-suspension bridge or stay-cantilevered bridge
The precinct of a cathedral
Close
Circular or polygonal farm building with a central shaft turned by a horse to drive agricultural machinery
Horsemill
Shelf on a carved bracket placed on the underside of a hinged choir stall seat to support an occupant while standing
Misericord
Painting on plaster
Fresco
Purlins that pass through or past the principal purlin
Through purlins
One of a series of small rooms; also a compartment of a groin-vault or rib-vault
Cell
Room in a church for sacred vessels and vestments
Sacristy
Courses of brickwork laid at right-angles to a slope, e.g. of a gable, forming triangles by tapering into horizontal courses
Tumbling or tumbling-in
Handrail or coping with balusters
Balustrade
Of concrete: cast as components before construction
Pre-cast
In canals, removable weir or similar device through which boats pass on a flush of water. Superseded by the pound lock
Flash lock
Slender single-light, pointed-arched window. Typical of the first phase of English Gothic (“Early English”) architecture
Lancet
Covering of overlapping tiles on a wall
Tile-hanging
Soft black marble quarried near Tournai in Belgium
Touch
Vessel for holy water, usually near a door
Stoup or holy water font
Subsidiary room or cell opening from the main body of an Anglo-Saxon church
Porticus (plural: porticus)
The classical manner of the 15th to the 17th centuries, especially that of Italy, as revived in the 19th century and later
Neo-Renaissance
A buttress which encases the angle
Clasping buttress
Girder of I-section, made from iron or steel plates
Plate girder
Arch with a vertical section above the impost, i.e. the horizontal moulding at the springing
Stilted arch
Artificial slope extending out and downwards from the parapet of a fort
Glacis
In a fort, the level surface of a rampart behind a parapet for mounting guns (image: a-b)
Terreplein
Range of columns supporting an entablature, without arches
Colonnade
A horizontal member in panelling or in a timber-framed wall
Rail
A retaining wall sunk into a ditch in a landscape garden or park, used to make a barrier without disrupting the view
Ha-ha
Brickwork with alternate courses of headers (short ends) and stretchers (long sides) exposed
English bond
Of a classical building: with no columns or vertical features.
Astylar
A four-lobbed opening
Quatrefoil
Short, usually curved braces connecting side purlins or ridge piece with principals
Wind-braces
Upright support in a structure
Post
A form of vault used after c. 1350, made up of halved concave masonry cones decorated with blind tracery
Fan-vault
Masonry whose stones are wholly or partly in a rough state and laid in a random pattern
Random rubble
A roof of two pitches, the upper one less steep than the lower
Mansard
Any face of a building or side of a room. In a drawing, the same or any part of it, represented in two dimensions
Elevation
Used for buildings of c. 1900 which eschew the use of any particular historical style, drawing instead on a mixture of (usually) late Gothic, Renaissance and Art Nouveau motifs
Free Style
A style at its peak c. 1920, more common on the Continenet than in Britain, and seen more often in painting and sculpture than in architecture. At its most extreme it uses jagged or distorted forms, often creating a mood of anguish or unease
Expressionism
A structural timber set upright in or against a wall
Wall-post
In a major church, the area behind the high altar and east chapel
Retrochoir, retroquire or back-choir
An ornamental feature suspended from a ceiling or vault
Pendant
In tracery in the Gothic style, a cusp or curved projection which has a v-shaped opening set within the apex
Kentish cusp or split cusp
Lowest, subordinate storey; hence the lowest part of a classical elevation, below the piano nobile or principal store
Basement
A type of timber construction in which curving paired members (blades) are supported on a tie-beam and rise to the apex
Upper cruck
A raised and enclosed platform for the preaching of sermons, with a reading desk below and clerk’s desk below that
Three-decker pulpit
Gutter along the eaves for rainwater
Rhone (Scots)
Horizontal member separating window lights
Transom
Masonry whose stones are coursed and present rough faces
Coursed rubble
The predominant style of mid- to late -16th-century Italy, in which classical motifs may be used in deliberate disregard of original conventions or contexts; by extension, a self-consciously formal approach to design in other idioms
Mannerism
Compartment designed for individual work or study
Carrel
Non-structural brick facing, using bricks laid long side outwards and in vertical (i.e. non-overlapping) tiers
Stack bond
A late-19th-century coinage for the revived Elizabethan or Jacobean styles
Jacobethan
To cut and mark timber against an irregular stone or plaster surface (image: right side)
Scribe (Scots)
A type of timber construction in which the upper supports or blades rise from halfway up the walls to a tie-beam or collar-beam, rather than continuing up to the apex
Middle cruck
Moulded and fired glazed terracotta (clay ornament or cladding), when coloured or left white
Faience
Of a porch or portico: having two columns
Distyle
Moulded stone frame round an armorial panel, often placed over the entrance to a tower house
Panel frame
Series of concave grooves (flutes) their common edges sharp (arris) or blunt (fillet). The reverse of reeding.
Fluting
A buttress which transmits the thrust to a heavy support (abutment) by means of an arch or half-arch
Flying buttress
Scratched drawing or writing
Graffito
External covering or skin applied to a structure, especially a framed building
Cladding
A timber-framed building, the projection of an upper storey beyond the storey below, made by the beams and joists of the lower storey oversailing the wall; on their outer ends is placed the sill of the walling for the storey above
Jetty
In a church or chapel, a basin for washing Mass vessels, provided with a drain, usually set in or against the wall to the south of an altar
Piscina
House and byre in the same range with internal access between them
Longhouse
Boards laid on the rafters to support the roof convering
Sarking (Scots)
A common version of the simplest and plainest of the three main classical orders, which features a frieze with triglyphs and metopes. The columns have simple round capitals with a narrow neck band and a plain or fluted shaft
Roman Doric
Wooden support for the building of an arch or vault, removed after completion
Centring
A small dome on a circular or polygonal base crowning a larger dome, roof or turret
Cupola
The eastern part or end of a church, where the altar is placed; usually set apart for the clergy
Chancel
A moulding like twisted strands of a rope
Cable moulding or rope moulding
Ornament in the Early English period of Gothic, consisting of small pyramids regularly repeated
Nailhead
Small gabled or roofed housing for a bell or bells
Bellcote
Single pair of lock gates allowing vessels to pass when the tide makes a level
Tidal gates
Division of an elevation or interior space as defined by regular vertical features such as arches, columns, windows, etc…
Bay
Small naked boy
Putto (pl. putti)
Subsidiary structure with a lean-to roof. Also a separately roofed structure on top of a multi-storey block of the 20th century or later
Penthouse
English type of late 12th- and early 13th- century decoraton in the form of thick uncurling foliage
Stiff-leaf
A screen of projecting fins or slats which deflect direct sunlight from windows
Brise-soleil
The diining hall of an abbey or monastery, traditionally placed in the south range of the cloister
Frater or refectory
Spiral scrolls. They occur on Ionic capitals
Volutes
A style of classical secular architecture at its peak in the early to mid-19th century, derived from the palaces of Renaissance Italy, but often varied by asymmetrical elements
Italianate
An approach to architecture and landscape design first defined by English theorists in the later 18th century. Characterized in architecture by irregular forms and textures, sometimes with the implication of gradual growth or decay, and in planning by a preference for asymmetrical layouts that composed into attractive views. Its influence continued into the 20th century, for instance in the arrangement of some post-war New Towns
Picturesque
A water-pipe; by extension, a public water-source, often architecturally or decoratively treated
Conduit
A form of bar tracery, used c.1300, which branches into a Y-shape
Y-tracery
Hinged openwork gate at a main doorway, made of iron bars alternately penetrating and penetrated
Yett (Scots)
A vault formed of two barrel vaults intersecting at right angles
Groin-vault
Stylized beam-ends in a Doric frieze, with metopes between
Triglyphs
Underground stone-lined passage and chamber
Souterrain
A long room or passage; an upper storey above the aisles of a church, looking through arches to the nave; a balcony or mezzanine overlooking the main interior space of a building
Gallery
Building or room circular in plan
Rotunda
The stone or brickwork worked to a finished face about an angle opening or other feature
Dressings
A rounded bartizan or turret, usually roofles and set at a corner
Angle round (Scots)
A roof truss framed at the bottom by crossed intersecting beams like open scissors
Scissors truss
Part of a wall or moulding that continues at a different angle, usually a right-angle
Return
An upright structural member, especially in the classical styles, of round section and with a shaft, a capital and usually a base
Column
Classical ribbed ornament like inverted fluting that flows into a lobed edge
Gadrooning
A large beam with its top rising in an arch
Bowed girder
Circular or polygonal windowed turret crowning a roof or a dome. Also the windowed stage of a crossing tower lighting a church interior
Lantern
Tudor panelling carved with simulations of folded linen
Linenfold
Artificial cutting away of the ground to form a steep slope
Scarp
A pediment with the centre of its base omitted
Open pediment
Composition of cement (calcined lime and clay), aggregate (small stones and rock chippings) sand and water. It can be poured into formwork or shuttering (temporary framing of timber or metal) on site (in situ) or pre-cast as components before construction.
Concrete
Free-standing bell-tower
Campanile
Transitional Romanesque style combining Anglo-Saxon and Norman features, current c. 1060-1100
Saxo-Norman
