footing

en-noun

footing (countable and uncountable, plural footings)

From Middle English fotyng; equivalent to foot + -ing.

(architecture, engineering) The thickened or sloping portion of a wall, or of an embankment at its foot; foundation.


exedra

From Ancient Greek ἐξ (ex, “out of”) + ἕδρα (hédra, “seat”).

(architecture) A semicircular recess, with stone benches, used as a place for discussion.


pillar

From Middle English piler, from Old French pilier, from Medieval Latin or Vulgar Latin *pilāre (“a pillar”), from Latin pila (“a pillar, pier, mole”).

(architecture) A large post, often used as supporting architecture.


stanza

From Italian stanza, from Vulgar Latin *stantia (“standing, stopping-place”), from Latin stāns, stantis, from stō, stāre, from Proto-Italic *staēō, from Proto-Indo-European *sth₂éh₁yeti, stative verb from *steh₂- (whence English stand). Doublet of stance.

der

(architecture) An apartment or division in a building.


courtyard

She sat in the courtyard, enjoying the garden.

An area, open to the sky, partially or wholly surrounded by walls or buildings.


indeterminate

en-adj

indeterminate (comparative more indeterminate, superlative most indeterminate)

more indeterminate (comparative)
most indeterminate (superlative)

It bears an affinity to the problem of indeterminate architecture—the indeterminate residential area.

2014, David Oakley, The Phenomenon of Architecture in Cultures in Change, page 196:

(architecture) Designed to allow the incorporation of future changes whose nature is not yet known.


trophy

→ Japanese: トロフィー (torofī)

→ Korean: 트로피 (teuropi)

→ Malayalam: ട്രോഫി (ṭrōphi)

From Middle French trophée, from Latin trophaeum (“a sign of victory, a monument”), tropaeum, from Ancient Greek τρόπαιον (trópaion, “monument of an enemy's defeat”), from neuter of τροπαῖος (tropaîos, “of defeat”), from τροπή (tropḗ, “a rout, a turning of an enemy”).

трафе́й

object taken by a hunter or conqueror of their success

The souvenirs which many killers retain of their victims are often described as trophies, and Norman Bates's taxidermic interests derived from the real-life Ed Gein.

1994, Philip Jenkins, Using Murder: The Social Construction of Serial Homicide, →ISBN, page 117:

A trophy from this murder would have been of great importance.

2001, R. Michael Gordon, Alias Jack the Ripper: Beyond the Usual Whitechapel Suspects, →ISBN, page 82:

The offender is also likely to mentally relive his killings, often with the help of souvenirs or trophies, such as a bracelet or a body part taken from the victim.

2004, Ronald F. Becker, Criminal Investigation, →ISBN, page 168:

(art, architecture) A display of weaponry and other militaria, often captured from a defeated enemy, as an ornament designed for the purpose of triumphalist display by a victor or as a show of military prowess by a monarch.


engawa

Romanization of Japanese 縁側 (engawa) or 掾側 (engawa).

(Japanese architecture) A veranda or terrace surrounding a house.


firewall

From fire + wall. Compare West Frisian brânmuorre, Dutch brandmuur, German Brandmauer, Feuermauer, Swedish brandvägg, brandmur, Icelandic eldvegg. The verb sense for using maximum power or acceleration comes from the engine's firewall being the limit of forward movement of the throttle controls on many simpler vehicles; thus, to get the maximum engine output, one would push the throttle levers or pedal all the way to the firewall.

(architecture) A fireproof barrier used to prevent the spread of fire between or through buildings, structures, electrical substation transformers, or within an aircraft or vehicle.


pre-stressed

en-adj

pre-stressed (comparative more pre-stressed, superlative most pre-stressed)

more pre-stressed (comparative)
most pre-stressed (superlative)

pre-stressed concrete

(engineering, architecture) Of a structural member, having stress already applied during the manufacturing process in the opposite direction to the stress expected in use.


bastion

First attested in 1562. From French bastion, from Old French bastille (“fortress”).

[…] Fort Camosun had swelled herself from being a little Hudson's Bay Fort, inside a stockade with bastions at the corners, into being the little town of Victoria, and the capital of British Columbia.

1942, Emily Carr, “Beginnings”, in The Book of Small, Toronto, Ont.: Oxford University Press, →OCLC:

(architecture) A projecting part of a rampart or other fortification.


aileron

Borrowed from French aileron, diminutive of aile (“wing”), also refers to the extremities of a bird's wings used to control their flight. It first appeared in print in the 7th edition of Cassell's French-English Dictionary of 1877, with its lead meaning of "small wing". In the context of powered airplanes it appears in print about 1908, in the French aviation journal L'Aérophile.

(architecture) A half gable, as at the end of a penthouse or of the aisle of a church.


parti

The basic, central, or main concept, drawing, or scheme of an architectural design.


decorated

decorated (comparative more decorated, superlative most decorated)

more decorated (comparative)
most decorated (superlative)

(architecture, not comparable) in one of the styles of English Gothic architecture


sprocket

sprockets (plural)
splocket (alternative)

Unknown. First attested in the 16th century. Perhaps related to Italian rocchetto (“spool”), spoletta (“spool”), sprone (“spur”), or English spoke, spike, spur.

(architecture) A flared extension at the base of a sloped roof.


baguette

Borrowed from French baguette (“stick”), from Italian bacchetta.

(architecture) A small molding, like the astragal, but smaller; a bead.


breezeway

dogtrot

the central breezeway within a dogtrot house

(Mid-Atlantic US) The space between two groups of rowhouses in the middle of a city block.


Jesse

From Ancient Greek Ἰεσσαί (Iessaí), from Hebrew יִשַׁי (Yishai).

(architecture) A representation of the genealogy of Christ, in decorative art, such as a genealogical tree in stained glass or a branched candlestick.


barleycorn

(architecture, woodworking) A small groove between two moldings.


cupola

Borrowed from Italian cupola, from Latin cūpula (“little tub”); from Latin cūpa, cuppa (“cup”); named for its resemblance to a cup turned over.

the light falling dimly through the foggy cupola.

1886, Robert Louis Stephenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde:

The stations on the City & South London were small but pretty, with cupolas to accommodate the winding gear of the small and claustrophobic hydraulic lifts.

2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 101:

(architecture) A dome-shaped ornamental structure located on top of a larger roof or dome.

قُبَّة

architecture: dome-shaped ornamental structure


deafening

en-noun

deafening (countable and uncountable, plural deafenings)


ogive

From late Middle English ogif, egeve, egeove, from Old French ogive, œgive, augive. Doublet of ogee.

(architecture) A Gothic pointed arch, or a rib of a Gothic vault.


casing

(architecture) The decorative trim around a door or window.


rotunda

rotundas (plural)
rotundae (plural)
Rotunda (alternative)

Learned borrowing from Latin rotunda, from rotundus (“round”). In the architectural sense, from Sancta Maria Rotunda (the name for a church in the Pantheon).

The rotunda begun but never completed by Abbot Wulfric (1047–59) at St Augustine’s Abbey as a link between the church of St Mary and that of St Peter and St Paul is an unusual and ambitious example of mid-eleventh-century English architecture which partly survives (fig. 4.6, top). […] Many of these rotundae are known to have had a special funerary function (as was the case at Canterbury).

1976, Bridget Cherry, “Ecclesiastical architecture”, in David M[ackenzie] Wilson, editor, The Archaeology of Anglo-Saxon England, London: Methuen & Co Ltd, →ISBN, pages 188–189:

The purely Greek character of the temple is revealed in the fact that there is no portico aligning the structure; Roman tholoi and rotundae are usually distinguished by a portico.

1998, “Antiquity”, in Bruce Almberg, Charles Earle, Michael Robinson, Katja Steiner, transl., edited by Stefan Grundmann, The Architecture of Rome: An Architectural History in 400 Individual Presentations, Stuttgart, London: Edition Axel Menges, →ISBN, page 29, column 2:

Access to the shafts is gained via a brick entrance rotunda below a glass dome. The walls of these rotundae are built over the outer edge of caissons which hold the shafts; […]

2014 December, Mary Mills, “Foot Tunnels beneath the River Thames”, in Nick Catford, editor, Subterranea, number 37, Ascot, Berkshire: Subterranea Britannica, →ISSN, page 66, column 2:

(architecture) A round building, usually small, often with a dome.

ротонда

architecture: round building, often with a dome


ossature

From French ossature, from Latin os (“bone”) + -ature.

(architecture) Any supporting framework under a vault, roof etc.


stilted

en-adj

stilted (comparative more stilted, superlative most stilted)

more stilted (comparative)
most stilted (superlative)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-stilted.wav

In Winchester Cathedral and Romsey Abbey Church, we have examples of what is called the stilted or horse-shoe arch, which is where the curvature of the arch does not spring immediately from the capitals or imposts of the piers, but the extreme points of the semicircle are continued straight down below the spring of the curve before they rest on the imposts, thus giving the idea of an arch stilted or raised, and somewhat approximating in form that of a horse-shoe.

1845, Matthew Holbeche Bloxam, “Of the Anglo-Norman Style”, in The Principles of Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture. With an Explanation of Technical Terms, and a Centenary of Ancient Terms, 7th edition, London: David Bogue, […], →OCLC, page 124:

The stilted arch was a good and much used expedient in ancient and modern times.

1920, G[eorg Gottlob] Ungewitter, K. Mohrmann, “Vaults”, in N[athan] Clifford Ricker, transl., Manual of Gothic Construction … Rewritten by K. Mohrmann … Leipzig 1890, 3rd edition, Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois, →OCLC, page 84:

The tombs have similar tombstones, each fashioned out of a rectangular block topped with another block in the form of a half drum, and with stilted semi-circular slabs for the head and foot stones.

2003, Mehrdad Shokoohy, “Kayalpatnam, the Renowned Muslim Port of Qā’il”, in Muslim Architecture of South India: The Sultanate of Ma’bar and the Traditions of Maritime Settlers on the Malabar and Coromandel Coasts (Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Goa), London, New York, N.Y.: RoutledgeCurzon, →ISBN, part 1 (The Coromandel Coast (Tamil Nadu)), page 129, column 2:

(architecture) Of a building or architectural feature such as an arch or vault: supported by stilts (“supporting pillars or posts”); also (generally) having the main part raised above the usual level by some structure.


lat

lats (plural)
lât (alternative)
lāt (alternative)
lath (alternative)

Borrowed from Hindi लाट (lāṭ, “pillar; minaret; staff, club”), लाठ (lāṭh, “long staff; cudgel”), etc.

bor+

A high pillar of stone called Bheem-lat, or the Tealee, or oilman's lat or staff.

1801, “Miscellaneous Tracts”, in Asiatic Annual Register, page 313:

(architecture) A monumental pillar, particularly the Buddhist columns erected in East India.


high tech

(architecture) A Late Modern architectural style incorporating elements of high-technology industry and seeking to communicate the underlying structure and function of a building.


breastwork

breastworks (plural)
breast-work (alternative)


zocle

(architecture) Alternative form of socle.


zocco

Borrowed from Italian zocco, from Latin soccus. Doublet of sock.


composite

en-adj

composite (comparative more composite, superlative most composite)

more composite (comparative)
most composite (superlative)

Borrowed from Middle French composite, from Latin compositus, past participle of compōnō (“put together”). Doublet of compost, compote, and kompot.

(architecture) Being a mixture of Ionic and Corinthian styles.

komposiitti-

being a mixture of Ionic and Corinthian styles


merus

From Ancient Greek μηρός (mērós, “thigh”).

(architecture) The plane surface between the channels of a triglyph.


viscous damper

(architecture) a form of shock absorber designed to reduce structural damage to buildings caused by earthquakes


tempering

Clay and tempering were packed around the pole together with plenty of water[.]

1983, Barry Cunliffe, chapter 6, in Danebury Hillfort, Stroud: Tempus:

(pottery, architecture) A non-plastic material, such as sand, added to clay to prevent shrinkage and cracking during drying or firing; temper.


sconce

Borrowed from Middle Dutch schans, cognate with German Schanze.


caracole

caracoles (plural)
caracol (alternative)

Borrowed from French caracole (noun, literally “snail's shell”), caracoler (verb).


orientalism

en-noun

orientalism (countable and uncountable, plural orientalisms)

orientalisms (plural)
Orientalism (alternative)

From French orientalisme, from oriental (“eastern, Oriental”). Equivalent to Oriental + -ism.

(art, architecture, literature) The tendency to represent eastern subjects, to assume stylistical characteristics original of the East.

اِسْتِشْراق

the tendency to represent eastern subjects


Tudor

en-adj

Tudor (comparative more Tudor, superlative most Tudor)

more Tudor (comparative)
most Tudor (superlative)

Borrowed from Welsh Tudur (“Theodoric”), from Proto-Celtic *Toutorīxs, later adopted as the surname of a British royal family. Piecewise doublet of Theodoric, Theoderic, Terry, and Derek.

piecewise doublet

A massive Tudor estate with a circular driveway, it looked more like an English finishing school than a home.

2015, Paul Beatty, The Sellout, Oneworld Publications (2016), page 247:

(architecture) In the style of English buildings of the sixteenth century; using exposed wooden beams on the exterior.

Túdarach

in the style of English buildings of the sixteenth century


stele

steles (plural)
stelai (plural)
stélé (alternative)
stelè (alternative)

From Ancient Greek στήλη (stḗlē, “upright rock; pillar; column”), plural form στῆλαι (stêlai). Doublet of stela.

uder

Stele. The ornaments on the ridge of a Greek temple, answering to the antefixæ on the summit of the flank entablatures, are thus designated.

c. 1840, Hosking, "Architecture" in Encyclopædia Britannica, III 470

(architecture, archaeology, obsolete) An acroterion, the decoration on the ridge of an ancient Greek building such as a temple.


pendentive

(architecture) The concave triangular sections of vaulting that provide the transition between a dome and the square base on which it is set and transfer the weight of the dome.


peristyle

From French péristyle, from Classical Latin peristȳlum, from περίστυλον (perístulon), from περι- (peri-, “around”) + στῦλος (stûlos, “pillar”).

af

The peristyle is a roofed structure, open at the sides, in which most of the ceremonials and dances take place.

1953, Maya Deren, Divine Horsemen, McPherson & Company, published 2004, page 47:

Most peristyles in Haiti have hard-packed dirt floors that can soak up libations when they're poured on the ground in honor of the spirits.

2007, Kevin Filan, The Haitian Vodou Handbook, Destiny Books, page 35:

(voodoo) A sacred roofed courtyard with a central pillar (the potomitan), used as a space for voodoo ceremonies, either alone or as an adjunct to an enclosed temple or altar-room.


revel

From Latin revellere; re- + vellere (“to pluck, pull”).

(architecture) Alternative form of reveal.


triforium

en-noun

triforium (plural triforia or triforiums)

/tɹaɪ̯ˈfɔːɹɪəm/

From Medieval Latin triforium, from tria (“three”) + for (“opening”) + -ium.

(architecture) The gallery of arches above the side-aisle vaulting in the nave of a church.


colonnette

(architecture) a small, thin column, especially one used to support an arcade


Ionian

en-adj

Ionian (comparative more Ionian, superlative most Ionian)

more Ionian (comparative)
most Ionian (superlative)

* (Hellenic, Ionia, architecture): Ionia + -n
* (moon of Jupiter): Io + -n- + -ian

(architecture) Alternative form of Ionic.

Synonym of Ionic.
Alternative form of Ionic.


drip

en-noun

drip (countable and uncountable, plural drips)

From Middle English drippe, from the verb (see above). Compare West Frisian drip (“drip”), Dutch drup (“drip”), Danish dryp (“drip”).
(style, swagger): Compare the verb sense "to have a superabundance of valuable things".

(architecture) That part of a cornice, sill course, or other horizontal member, which projects beyond the rest, and has a section designed to throw off rainwater.


dormant

From Middle English, from Old French, from Latin dormiēns, present participle of dormiō (“I sleep”).

dormaunt (alternative)
dormient (alternative)


dormant

dormants (plural)
dormaunt (alternative)
dormient (alternative)


modulation

modulation (countable and uncountable, plural modulations)

/ˌmɑd͡ʒəˈleɪʃən/

From Late Middle English modulacion, modulacioun (“act of making music or singing; harmony; melody, song”), from Middle French modulation (modern French modulation), and directly from its etymon Latin modulātiō (“regular or rhythmical measure, modulation; inflection of tone; (architecture) calculation of measurements from a standard unit; (Late Latin) act of making music or singing; melody, song”), from modulātus (“modulated”) + -iō (suffix forming abstract nouns from verbs). Modulātus is a perfect participle of modulor (“to beat time; to make music or sing; to measure; etc.”), from modulus (“rhythmical measure, interval; rhythm; small interval or measure, etc.”) + -or (suffix forming certain inflections of verbs); and modulus is from modus (“measure; method; etc.”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *med- (“to measure; etc.”)) + -ulus (diminutive suffix). By surface analysis, modulat(e) + -ion (suffix denoting an action or process, or its result).

listen/core

Modulation vocal music example duple.mid

изменение

modification or regulation of something to achieve an appropriate measure or proportion; an instance of this

About Theatres, ſaith He [Vitruvius], are Porticoes, and VValks, vvhich appear ought to be ſo placed, as they muſt be double. And have the outvvard Columns Dorick vvith Architraves, and Ornaments made from the rule of the Dorick modulation.

1665, John Webb, A Vindication of Stone-Heng Restored: […], London: […] R[alph] Davenport for Tho[mas] Bassett, […], →OCLC, page 62:

(architecture, uncountable, rare) Modification of the parts of a classical Greek or Roman building to achieve appropriate proportions by measuring in modules (“standard units of measure, usually the diameter or radius of a column at the base of a shaft”).


hoarding

(architecture, historical) A roofed wooden shield placed over the battlements of a castle and projecting from them.

cadafal

roofed wooden shield over the battlements


Queenslander

From Queensland + -er (suffix attached to placename proper nouns denoting inhabitants or residents of those places).

suffix

Originally built in 1907 and designed by New Zealand-born architect R[obert] S[mith] (Robin) Dods, Alma-den was a high-set Queenslander, with a large verandah around three sides of the house. Underneath in the front, Ted had a small study-cum-library-cum-hobby space, and from the time the family moved to New Farm he began to collect a library.

1994, Ross Fitzgerald, “Labour in Power, 1915–1919”, in “Red Ted”: The Life of E. G. Theodore, St. Lucia, Qld.: University of Queensland Press, →ISBN, page 74:

[A] conveniently located 4-star B&B in a restored traditional Queenslander, offering 6 spacious en suites and 1 luxury suite with spa, pool and off-street parking.

2003, Darroch Donald, East Coast Australia: Sydney to Cairns (Footprint Handbooks), Bath, Somerset: Footprint, →ISBN:

Any house built substantially of wood and lasting more than twenty years is now a "Queenslander" it seems and commands a premium. […] The Queenslander lifestyle is meant to convey a mood of summer indolence, perhaps by the pool but certainly taking in a verandah and an open-plan weekend in which cold drinks and friends replace the claustrophobia and TV of the brick bungalow. […] There is also a pleasing sense of history to the Queenslander: the patina of tradition is added to what is a functionally pleasant building.

2006 winter, Melissa Lucashenko, “Not Quite White in the Head”, in Frank Stewart, Larissa Behrendt, Barry Lopez, Mark Tredinnick, editors, Where The Rivers Meet: New Writing from Australia (Mānoa; volume 18, number 2), Honolulu, Hi.: University of Hawaiʻi Press, →ISBN, →ISSN, page 29:

I live in a quintessential (Australian) building type myself—a high-set ‘Queenslander’ on Captain [James] Cook’s tropical Cape Tribulation coast—and some of the details I love most about it are its Deco influences—[…]

2021 October 20, Joseph Brennan, “A Key Part of Our Diverse Railway Heritage”, in Rail, number 942, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: Bauer Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 56:

(Australia, architecture) A house built in an architectural style found in Queensland, characterized by being raised up on stumps about two metres off the ground, and having wide verandahs around it.

クインズランド式住宅

クイーンスランドしき じゅうたく


reins

From Old French reins, see also rein in French.

(architecture) The parts of a vault between the crown and the spring or abutment, including, and having especial reference to, the loading or filling behind the shell of the vault.


skylight

(architecture) A window, dome, or opening in the roof or ceiling, to admit natural light.


taenia

taenias (plural)
taeniae (plural)
tænia (alternative)
tenia (alternative)

From Latin taenia, from Ancient Greek ταινία (tainía, “ribbon, tape”).

uder

2004, William Bell Dinsmoor, The Propylaia to the Athenian Acropolis, Volume 2: The Classical Building, page 165,
The height of the taenia was likewise determined with regard to the total height of the epistyle, and again, although we should not expect a proportion of less than one-twelfth of the total height (as in the Parthenon), it is reduced to one-thirteenth, executed as 0.089-0.090 m.

(architecture, Doric architecture) A band between the frieze and architrave in the Doric order.


arcading

en-noun

arcading (countable and uncountable, plural arcadings)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-arcading.wav

[…] the intimate and cloistered loveliness of the chancel, with its pointed arcading, graceful ribbed vault and five narrow east lancets, led his attention on and focused it first upon the remote glow of the sanctuary.

1934, Dorothy L. Sayers, The Nine Tailors, London: Victor Golancz:

(countable, architecture) An arrangement of arcades.


lancet

From Middle English launcet, from Old French lancete, a diminutive of lance. By surface analysis, lance + -et.

He looked away, into the cavernous space emptying of people. Up in the galleries and behind the choir, the wide window lancets were sheets of black.

2014, Richard Powers, Orfeo, W. W. Norton & Company, page 234:

(architecture) A high narrow window, terminating in an arch acutely pointed, often double or triple, common in the first half of the 13th century.


casement window

casement window (plural casement windows)

A window that has frames hinged on the side and that opens outward or inward.

Flügelfenster

but often understood to mean one with two frames


fanlight

an electric fan, usually a ceiling fan, that is also a light fixture


arabesque

/ˌæɹ.əˈbɛsk/

/ˌæɹ.əˈbɛsk/

Borrowed from French arabesque, from Italian arabesco, from arabo (“Arab”). By surface analysis, Arab + -esque.

It was a sort of scene which Adam had beheld almost weekly for years; he knew by heart every arabesque flourish in the framed specimen of Bartle Massey’s handwriting which hung over the schoolmaster’s head, by way of keeping a lofty ideal before the minds of his pupils; […].

1859, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter XXI, in Adam Bede […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC:

The house of Ruthven was a small but ultra-modern limestone affair, between Madison and Fifth ;[…]. As a matter of fact its narrow ornate façade presented not a single quiet space that the eyes might rest on after a tiring attempt to follow and codify the arabesques, foliations, and intricate vermiculations of what some disrespectfully dubbed as “ near-aissance.”

1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter V, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

(art, architecture, also attributively) An elaborate design of intertwined floral figures or complex geometrical patterns, mainly used in Islamic art and architecture.


carrel

carrels (plural)
carol (alternative)
carrol (alternative)
carrell (alternative)

From Medieval Latin carula, probably from Latin corolla (“little crown”) in the sense of “ring”; or from Middle English caroll, from Medieval Latin carola, from Late Latin carola (“round dance; round object”), from Latin choraula, variant of choraulēs (“flute player”) (further etymology at carol).

der

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-carrel.wav

Carol, or Carrel. A little pew, or closet, in a cloister, to sit and read in. They were common in greater monasteries, as Duram, Gloucester, Kirkham in Yorkshire, &c.; and had their name from the carols, or sentences inscribed on the walls about them, which often were couplets in rhyme. [Carola, Low Latin.]

1822, Edward James Willson, comp., “Carol, or Carrel”, in A Glossary of Technical Terms, Descriptive of Gothic Architecture: Collected from Official Records, Passages in the Works of Poets, Historians, &c. of a Date Contemporay with that Style: And Collated with the Elucidations and Notes of Various Commentators, Glossarists, and Modern Editors. To Accompany the Specimens of Gothic Architecture, by A[gustus] Pugin, – Architect, 3rd edition, London: Printed for J[ohn] Taylor, Architectural Library, 59, High Holborn; J. Britton, Burton Street; and A. Pugin, 34, Store Street, →OCLC, pages 2–3:

An exquisite south-east door is preserved; it is round-headed, of four orders, with a foliated label. A canopied carol or monk's seat, a Pointed crocketed arch within a square case, is seen beside it, succeeded on the south wall by an arcade of trefoiled arches with toothed mouldings.

1860, Mackenzie Walcott, “[The Abbeys of Scotland.] Melrose”, in The Minsters and Abbey Ruins of the United Kingdom: Their History, Architecture, Monuments, and Traditions; with Notices of the Larger Parish Churches and Collegiate Chapels, London: Edward Stanford, 6, Charing Cross, →OCLC, page 257:

(architecture) A small closet or enclosure built against a window on the inner side, to sit in for study.


blind spot

blind spots (plural)
blindspot (alternative)

زاوِية مَيِّتة

part of the road/railway track/tramway track that cannot be seen

(architecture) The flaw of building that cannot be seen when collapsing because poor structure, built not according specified standards, or not earthquake-proof.


frontispiece

frontispieces (plural)
frontispice (alternative archaic)

From Middle French frontispice, from Latin frontispicium, from frōns (“forehead”) + speciō (“to look at”). Spelling altered due to folk etymology, influenced by piece.

(architecture) A façade, especially an ornamental one.

(architecture) A small ornamental pediment, especially at the top of a window or door.


glazed

a shelter at the bus stop with glazed sides and rear

a glazed garden shed

(architecture, construction) Having glass in the windows.


design pattern

software engineering
software engineering

(architecture, software engineering) A formal way of documenting a general reusable solution to a design problem in a particular field of expertise.

návrhový vzor

general solution to a variety of similar problems


tribune

From Middle English tribune, from Old French tribun, tribune, from Latin tribunus (“tribune, tribal leader”), from tribus (“tribe”).

(Christianity, architecture) The domed or vaulted apse in a cathedral housing the bishop's throne (see).

tribuna

domed or vaulted apse in a Christian church


tympanum

Borrowed from Latin tympanum (“a drum, timbrel, tambourine; the eardrum”). Doublet of timbre, timpani, timbal, and tymbal.

قَلْب القَوْصَرَة

(architecture) A vertical recessed triangular space between the sides of a pediment, typically decorated

It was a black-and-white picture of a Romanesque doorway, with flanking saints and a lively Last Judgement in the tympanum […].

2004, Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty […], London: Picador, →ISBN:

The recessed triangular space within an arch, and above a lintel or a subordinate arch, spanning the opening below the arch


timpanum

timpanums (plural)
timpana (plural)
tympanum (alternative)

(architecture) An ornamental panel in any triangular space.


concha

en-noun

concha (plural conchae or (archaic) conchæ)

conchae (plural)
conchæ (archaic plural)

Borrowed from Late Latin concha (“a mussel shell”). Doublet of conch.

bor+

(architecture) An apse, or the plain semidome of an apse.


dingbat

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Unknown, US mid 19th century. The word-puzzle sense comes from the board game Dingbats, which is based on these puzzles.

(architecture) An architectural style of apartment building, where the second storey overhangs an area for parking cars.


jamb

jambs (plural)
jambe (alternative)
jaum (alternative obsolete)

From Middle English jambe, jaumbe, from Old French jambe (“leg”), from Late Latin gamba (“hock, shank, leg, thigh”), from Ancient Greek καμπή (kampḗ, “turning post, bend or flexure”). Doublet of gam, gamb, gamba, and jambe.

der

(architecture, interior decorating, carpentry) Either of the vertical components that form the side of an opening in a wall, such as that of a door frame, window frame, or fireplace.

яңаҡ

vertical component that form the side of an opening in a wall


Dutch door

A door that is divided horizontally into two parts such that the upper part may be opened independently of the lower.

荷蘭門 /荷兰门

door that is divided into two horizontally


easement

en-noun

easement (countable and uncountable, plural easements)

From Anglo-Norman aisement, easement, eisement, esament, esement, and Middle French aisement (“comfort, convenience, ease, facility, opportunity; a benefit, relief; a right to use land, a thing, etc.; a privy”), from aisier (“to put at ease; to facilitate”) + -ment (“-ment, suffix forming nouns, usually the action or state resulting from verbs”).

der

The curved part of the rail where it joins the newel is called an easement. Often, however, the rail joins the newel without an easement.

1986, Jack P[ayne] Jones, “Designing and Building Stairs”, in Handbook of Construction Contracting, volume 1 (Plans, Specs, Building), Carlsbad, Calif.: Craftsman Book Company, →ISBN, page 240:

In preparation for laying out the easement used to join the first- and second-flight handrails, tack a piece of plywood about 5 inches wide to the bottom side of the gooseneck fitting and the handrail of the first flight. These pieces are used to rest the connecting easement against when laying out the joint.

2013, Floyd Vogt, Carpentry, 6th edition, Clifton Park, N.Y.: Delmar, Cengage Learning, →ISBN, page 932:

(architecture) An element such as a baseboard, handrail, etc., that is curved instead of abruptly changing direction.


xystus

From Ancient Greek ξυστός (xustós, “smooth; scraped”), from ξύω (xúō, “scrape”), referring to its polished floor.

bor

(historical, architecture, in Ancient Greece) A long and open portico within the gymnasium.

Xystus in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)


springing

en-noun

springing (countable and uncountable, plural springings)

The arch failed first at the crown, then at the quarterings, and finally at the springings. After demolition the girders for half the new structure were erected on bedstones already built on the abutments behind the springings of the old arch.

1941 February, “Bridge demolition by lifting”, in Railway Magazine, pages 74–75:

(countable, architecture, archaic) The spring of an arch: the lowest part of an arch on both sides.


wainscot

From Middle English waynscot, from Middle Low German wagenschot, assumed to be from wagen (“wagon”) + schot, believed to mean “partition”.

[…] this fellow will but join you together as they join wainscot; then one of you will prove a shrunk panel, and like green timber, warp, warp.

1598, William Shakespeare, As You Like It, act 3, scene 3:

Entering that gable-ended Spouter-Inn, you found yourself in a wide, low, straggling entry with old-fashioned wainscots, reminding one of the bulwarks of some condemned old craft.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 3, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 11:

(architecture) An area of wooden (especially oaken) panelling on the lower part of a room’s walls.

տախտակամած

an area of wooden panelling on the lower part of a room's walls


mastaba

mastabas (plural)
mastabah (alternative)

Borrowed from Arabic مَصْطَبَة (maṣṭaba).

bor+

The pyramids at Giza are flanked by large cemeteries containing hundreds of mastabas.

(architecture) A rectangular structure with a flat top and slightly sloping sides, built during Ancient Egyptian times above tombs that were situated on flat land. Mastabas were made of wood, mud bricks, stone, or a combination of these materials. Some are solid structures, while others can contain one or more rooms, sometimes decorated with paintings or inscriptions.

مَصْطَبَة

rectangular tomb structure with a flat top and slightly sloping sides


garret window

garret windows (plural)
garret-window (alternative archaic)

(architecture) A skylight that lies along the slope of the roof.


lanai

‘If they vomit in the lanai, that's for the butler to handle.’

1953, Raymond Chandler, The Long Goodbye, Penguin, published 2010, page 22:

In Honolulu, Nancy Peacock, an architect, said her clients increasingly requested “punees,” as daybeds are known in Hawaii — sometimes on the lanai, the covered porch of the house.

2007 March 11, Tracie Rozhon, “To Have, Hold and Cherish, Until Bedtime”, in New York Times:

Afterward, Lili‘u and Stevenson found time to talk quietly with each other on the bungalow's lānai.

2012, Julia Flynn Siler, Lost Kingdom, Grove Press, page 158:

(chiefly Hawaii, Florida) A Hawaiian-style roofed patio.


thole

Anglicization of Latin tholus (“cupola, dome, rotunda”), from Ancient Greek θόλος (thólos, “dome, vault”), further etymology uncertain but possibly cognate with θᾰ́λᾰμος (thắlămos, “bedroom; inner chamber”) and/or English dale. Doublet of tholus and tholos.

der

Philostratus relates that the king's house in Babylon had a roof of brass, which shone like lightning, and that in that house there was a chamber, whose ceiling was a thole (that is, a concave hemisphere) made in imitation of some system of the heaven, and with sapphire-coloured stones, […] and from the thole were suspended four golden doves, or iynges, who were called the Tongues of the Gods.

1828, [Algernon Herbert], “Ba-bel”, in Nimrod: A Discourse on Certain Passages of History and Fable, volume I, London: Printed [by Thomas Davison] for Richard Priestley, →OCLC, page 206:

(architecture) A cupola, a dome, a rotunda; a tholus.


low-rise

low-rises (plural)
lowrise (alternative)
low rise (alternative)

(architecture): A retronym created as an antonym to high-rise.

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(architecture) A building of no more than a few stories.


Palladian

Alessandro Maganza
Andrea Palladio
Lemon Hill
Library of Congress
Palazzo Chiericati

From Italian Palladio, the surname of Andrea Palladio (1508–1580) + -an (suffix forming adjectives from nouns).

refn

From the collection of the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., USA.

suffix

You ſhow us, Rome was glorious, not profuſe, / And pompous Buildings once were things of uſe. / Yet ſhall (my Lord) your juſt, your noble Rules / Fill half the land with Imitating Fools: / […] / Conſcious they act a true Palladian part, / And if they ſtarve, they ſtarve by the Rules of Art.

1735, Alexander Pope, “[Ethic Epistles, the Second Book. To Several Persons.] Epistle IV. To Richard Earl of Burlington.”, in The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope, volume II, London: […] J. Wright, for Lawton Gilliver […], →OCLC, pages 40–41, lines 23–26 and 37–38:

His [William Kent's] claim to this fellowship to the Palladian school rests upon the felicitous manner in which he caught its sentiment, and the rich and varied assistance he threw into the Palladian structure.

1841 June, Frederick East, “The Palladian School of Architects”, in The Civil Engineer and Architect’s Journal, Scientific and Railway Gazette, volume IV, number 45, London: Published for the proprietor, […] H. Hooper [et al.], →OCLC, page 179, column 1:

We can quite, therefore, go to the length of thinking that perhaps the most suitable churches in which to revive the mosaic-medallion window are the Palladian churches of London. […] Surely Romanesque and Palladian are homogeneous deflections from classical art, and are not unreasonably interchangeable.

1849 October, “Chapters on Stained Glass.—No. II. [William] Warrington and [Charles] Winston.”, in The Ecclesiologist, volume VII, number XXXVIII (New Series; volume X, number LXXIV overall), London: Published under the superintendence of the Ecclesiological late Cambridge Camden Society; [printed by] Joseph Masters, […], published 1850, →OCLC, page 96:

The Palladian window of the end wall is a masterpiece, however, in its admirable proportions, its relationship to the wall and the restrained decorative quality of the details. It is deserving of admiration in its own right as well as being historically interesting as the first appearance of the Palladian motive in American Georgian architecture.

1935, David M[etheny] Robb, J[ames] J. Garrison, “American Architecture from Its Origins to 1870”, in Art in the Western World, New York, N.Y., London: Harper & Brothers publishers, →OCLC, page 206:

It [the house] was Palladian of a sort, since even I could see it was not good Palladian. Too high for its width, its portico was stunted and the wings which ran out on either side were too short and too low to give grace and style to the elevation.

1990 August, John Welcome [pseudonym; John N. H. Brennan], chapter 16, in A Painted Devil (Ulverscroft Large Print Series), London: William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd., →ISBN, page 290:

And he had always thought that a Palladian villa set in a verdant English park was a very beautiful sight. He saw it as the perfect marriage of a building with nature.

2005, Barbara Taylor Bradford, Unexpected Blessings, paperback edition, London: HarperCollins Publishers, →ISBN:

(architecture) In the style of the Italian neoclassical architect Andrea Palladio.

pal·ladià

in the style of the Italian neoclassical architect Andrea Palladio


Palladian

What is quite certain that Georgian Palladianism without him [Colen Campbell] would have developed later and would have been quite different, and the legacy of the English Palladians, accepted but rarely acknowledged by their most adventurous but no more dedicated successors, would have been less rich.

1967, Howard E. Stutchbury, “Conclusion”, in The Architecture of Colen Campbell, Manchester: Manchester University Press, →OCLC, page 144:

[Peter Paul] Rubens' credo could be a rubric for [Joseph] Furttenbach's work. He is not a Palladian like [Heinrich von] Schickhardt, but takes up Italian Renaissance architecture in a both geographically and temporally broad span, attempting to make it a model for Central European requirements.

1994, Hanno-Walter Kruft, “The German-speaking Regions in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries”, in Ronald Taylor, Elsie Callander, Antony Wood, transl., A History of Architectural Theory from Vitruvius to the Present, New York, N.Y.: Princeton Architectural Press; London: Zwemmer, Philip Wilson Publishers, →ISBN, page 172:

To compound the problem, when the collaborations were over and [Nicholas] Hawksmoor came into his own, as it were, designing six churches by himself, the neo-Palladians were coming into fashion, displacing, and even dismissing, their baroque contemporaries.

2015, Cedric D. Reverand II, “Nicholas Hawksmoor: The Other English Baroque Architect”, in Cedric D. Reverand II, editor, Queen Anne and the Arts (Transits; Literature, Thought & Culture, 1650–1850), Lewisburg, Pa., Lanham, Md.: Bucknell University Press; The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, →ISBN, page 227:

(architecture) An architect who designs buildings in the Palladian style.

palladiano

Anything [i.e., any type of window] with a rounded top became known as a Palladian and was seen as an instant evocation of history, status, class, and tradition. In some cases, an oversized Palladian filled an entire facade of a house.

2001, Alastair Gordon, “Epilogue: Past Perfect”, in Weekend Utopia: Modern Living in the Hamptons, New York, N.Y.: Princeton Architectural Press, →ISBN, page 166, column 1:

From the outside, Strokestown House is a most attractive building. [...] And unlike some of the monster Palladians in this country, places like Castletown or Powerscourt, both near Dublin, Strokestown, being in the uncivilized west, is a far more modest proposition and thereby more appealing and approachable.

2002, James Charles Roy, “The Work of Angels”, in The Back of Beyond: A Search for the Soul of Ireland, Boulder, Colo., Oxford, Oxfordshire: Westview Press, →ISBN:

(architecture) A building or an architectural element (for example, a window) designed in the Palladian style.


swash

en-noun

swash (countable and uncountable, plural swashes)

Scandinavian. Compare Swedish dialect svasska, Norwegian svakka, English dialect swack (“a blow”).

The lathe was, in process of time, adapted to the production of oval figures, twisted and swash-work, as it is called, and, lastly, of rose-engine work. The swash, or raking mouldings, were employed in the balusters of staircases and other ornaments at the period of the "Renaissance" in architecture, about the end of the sixteenth century, and, therefore, the swash-lathe assumes somewhat of the character of a manufacturing machine.

1856, Lectures on the Progress of Arts and Science, page 230:

The artisans of the Middle Ages were very skilful in the use of the lathe, and turned out much beautiful screen and stall work, still to be seen in our cathedrals, as well as twisted and swash-work for the balusters of staircases and other ornamental purposes.

2019, Samuel Smiles, Industrial Biography: Iron Workers and Tool Makers:

(architecture) An oval figure, whose mouldings are oblique to the axis of the work.


altar screen

(architecture, Christianity) A partition, often richly decorated, separating the nave from the chancel in a church; a rood screen.


belfry

From Middle English belfrey, bellfray, belfray, from Old French belfroi, berfroi, berfrey (changed to have an ⟨l⟩ by association with bell), from Middle High German bërcvrit or bërvrit (“defensive tower”) (modern German Bergfried), possibly via Late Latin berefredus, from Proto-Germanic *bergafriþuz. Doublet of bergfried.

камбанария

tower or steeple specifically for containing bells, especially as part of a church

“You know, this house does have a belfry filled with local bats. Maybe Laszlo went up there.” “Oh, so like my darling perverted husband, to sniff out the local bordello immediately upon arrival. [chuckles] Could you take me to the belfry?”

2023 August 31, William Meny & Paul Simms, “A Weekend at Morrigan Manor” (9:33 from the start), in What We Do in the Shadows, season 5, episode 9, spoken by The Guide (Kristen Schaal):

(architecture) A tower or steeple typically containing bells, especially as part of a church.

From the belfries far and near the funereal deathbell tolled unceasingly while all around the gloomy precincts rolled the ominous warning of a hundred muffled drums punctuated by the hollow booming of pieces of ordnance.

1922 February, James Joyce, “[The Cyclops]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:

(architecture) A part of a large tower or steeple, specifically for containing bells.


cuneus

Borrowed from Latin cuneus. Doublet of coign and coin.

(architecture) One of a set of wedge-shaped divisions separated by stairways, found in the Ancient Roman theatre and in mediaeval architecture.


French window

French windows (plural)
french window (alternative)

(architecture) An outside door with glass panes, serving as a window and a door


supertall

Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat

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(architecture) A building between 300m and 600m tall, approximately 1000ft to 2000ft tall. A tall building taller than a plain tall but shorter than a megatall.


cella

Learned borrowing from Latin cella. Doublet of cell and hall.

Room by room, Sarrasine advances to the cella of the hermaphrodite god, veiled like Spenser's Venus.

(architecture) The central, enclosed part of an ancient temple, as distinguished from the open porticos.


vaulted

en-adj

vaulted (comparative more vaulted, superlative most vaulted)

more vaulted (comparative)
most vaulted (superlative)

It was a large vaulted apartment, and had been once a chapel: but it was now half library, half laboratory.

1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “Age and Youth”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 10:

(architecture) Of a ceiling supported by arches, introduced in the Gothic style.


loggia

en-noun

loggia (plural loggias or logge or loggie)

loggias (plural)
logge (plural)
loggie (plural)

Borrowed from Italian loggia, from Old French loge, from Medieval Latin laubĭa, from Frankish *laubijā. Doublet of lobby and lodge.

(architecture) A roofed, open gallery, usually on an upper level.


catenary bridge

catenary bridge (plural catenary bridges)

(architecture) a bridge in which the horizontal deck is suspended from a reverse catenary to counteract bending


spec home

A home that is built by or for a homebuilder according to their specifications without a purchase order; it is instead built on spec.


corb

(architecture) An ornament in a building; a corbel.


broached spire

(architecture) An octagonal spire rising from a square tower without a parapet, with pyramidal forms at the angles.


Bethlehem

Inherited from Middle English Bethleem, from Old French Bethleem and Old English Bethleem, from Latin Bēthlehēmum, from Ancient Greek Βηθλεέμ (Bēthleém), from Hebrew בֵּית לֶחֶם (bēṯ lɛ́ḥɛm, literally “house of bread”). Doublet of bedlam and Belém.

der

[…] to the Hebrew and Arabic word “korban” as now used in the Abyssinian Church to denote the sacramental bread specially prepared in the “Bethlehem,” or “House of Bread.”

1869, John Baron, Anglosaxon witness on four alleged requisites for holy communion:

A small building, attached to Ethiopic churches, usually at the eastern end of the sacrarium, in which the deacon prepares and bakes the bread for use in the eucharist. This building is called the Bethlehem, or “house of bread.”

1882, William Audsley, George Ashdown Audsley, Popular Dictionary of Architecture and the Allied Arts, page 200:

The deacon rings a bell when bread is brought from the bethlehem to the maqdas and at other liturgical times

2006, Geoffrey Wainwright, Robert Earl Cushman, Karen B. Westerfield Tucker, The Oxford History of Christian Worship, page 143:

The priests and deacons assigned to the service wash their feet and hands, usually near the 'Bethlehem'.

2014, Bryan D. Spinks, Do this in Remembrance of Me, page 174:

(architecture) In the Ethiopic church, a small building attached to a church edifice, in which the bread for the Eucharist is made.


spere

(architecture) The fixed structure between the great hall and the screens passage in an English medieval timber house.


odeon

odea (plural)
odeons (plural)
odeion (alternative)
odeum (alternative)

From Ancient Greek ᾠδεῖον (ōideîon), from ᾠδή (ōidḗ, “song”).

The other building type similar to theatres, although smaller and generally roofed, was the odeon. Unlike theatres and amphitheatres, odea were not built in all of the larger Roman towns, although they became more common in the second century ad.

1986, John H. Humphrey, Roman Circuses: Arenas for Chariot Racing, University of California Press, →ISBN, page 3:

However, the significance of this transformation should not be overstated: it was not converted in to a church until the 6th c., and political meetings are attested in the nearby odeon, from late acclamations. Sagalassos is in fact the only eastern bouleuterion to show decay in the 5th c. Other examples are known that are generically dated to Late Antiquity: from Aizanoi and Ptolemais, both with bouleuteria-odea converted to aquatic spectacles, from Selge, where the building was converted into a church, and from Seleuceia-Lyrbe, where the building seems to have been transformed into a row of shops.

2021, Luke Lavan, Public Space in the Late Antique City, Brill, →ISBN, page 310:

Based on its small size, the excavators have suggested it may have been an odeon with a seating capacity of between 150 and 200 people; see Uziel, Lieberman, and Solomon (2019, 245–48). Odea were, initially at least, designed for small-scale concerts and recitals; but this distinction blurred over time and varied depending upon the size and resources of individual cities.

2023, Courtney J. P. Friesen, Acting Gods, Playing Heroes, and the Interaction between Judaism, Christianity, and Greek Drama in the Early Common Era, Routledge, →ISBN, page 30:

An ancient Greek or Roman building used for performances of music and poetry.


coffered

coffered ceiling

[…] stirred by the air / That freshened from the window, these ascended / In fattening the prolonged candle-flames, / Flung their smoke into the laquearia, / Stirring the pattern on the coffered ceiling.

1922 October, T[homas] S[tearns] Eliot, “Part II. A Game of Chess.”, in The Waste Land, 1st book edition, New York, N.Y.: Boni and Liveright, published December 1922, →OCLC, page 18:


fust

Borrowed from Old French fust (“wood; bole, tree trunk”) (modern French fût), from Latin fūstis (“knobbed stick, cudgel, club”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰew- (“to hit”) or *gʷʰen- (“to strike; to kill, slay”).

Cherici, Giuseppe, & Sons, Volterra. A large alabaster vase, after the Etrurian style; executed in the exhibitors' manufactory in Volterra, […] The vase is placed on the fust of a column of the Tuscan order.

1851, “Tuscany”, in Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, 1851: Official Descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue. By Authority of the Royal Commission. In Three Volumes, volume III (Foreign States), London: Spicer Brothers, wholesale stationers; W[illiam] Clowes and Sons, printers; contractors to the Royal Commission, 29 New Bridge Street, Blackfriars, and at the Exhibition building, →OCLC, item 109, page 1298, column 2:

Façade of the Benedictines' convent and church wonderfully crowded with ornaments, as likewise the altars generally adorned with twisted pillars flourished all over, and loaden with little puttini, birds, and the like in clusters on the chapiters and between the wreaths along the fusts of the columns.

1871, George Berkeley, Alexander Campbell Fraser, “Journal of a Tour in Italy in 1717, 1718”, in Life and Letters of George Berkeley, D.D. formerly Bishop of Cloyne; and an Account of His Philosophy. With Many Writings of Bishop Berkeley hitherto Unpublished: Metaphysical, Descriptive, Theological by Alexander Campbell Fraser, M.A. Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in the University of Edinburgh (The Works of George Berkeley, D.D.; IV), volume IV, Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 550:

(architecture) The shaft (main body) of a column.


flying buttress

en-noun

flying buttress (plural flying buttresses)

(architecture) A buttress that stands apart from the structure that it supports, and is connected to it by an arch (flyer).


buttress

buttresses (plural)
buttrice (alternative)

From Old French ars bouterez (noun, literally “supporting arcs”), from bouterez (adjective), oblique plural of bouteret (rare in the singular), from Frankish *bôtan, from Proto-Germanic *bautaną (“to push”). Ultimately cognate with beat.

der

It was decided, therefore, to build eight concrete buttresses from the new strengthening work to safeguard the general stability of the wall along the length where the greatest movement had taken place.

1954 June, “Strengthening of River Calder Retaining Wall, N.E.R.”, in Railway Magazine, page 429:

(architecture) A brick, concrete or stone structure built against another structure to support it.

контрафорс

brick or stone structure built against another structure to support it


marquise

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-marquise.wav

The house was a big elaborate limestone affair, evidently new. Winter sunshine sparkled on lace-hung casement, on glass marquise, and the burnished bronze foliations of grille and door.

1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter I, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

(architecture) A canopy, usually of glass, set as a shelter over a door opening onto a terrace or pavement.


MUGA

(architecture) Acronym of multiuse games area.


lambrequin

lambrequins (plural)
lambrekin (alternative)

Borrowed from French lambrequin, from Middle French lambequin, from Middle Dutch lepperkijn, lappekijn, from Old Dutch lappakīn (“little cloth”). Compare modern English lapkin.

(architecture) A decorative architectural element placed along the eaves of a roof, the edges of an overhang, etc.


exonarthex

en-noun

exonarthex (plural exonarthexes or exonarthices)

exonarthexes (plural)
exonarthices (plural)

The exonarthex is of inferior workmanship, and has been thought by some of later date than the rest of the church; but there seems no ground for this belief.

1850, John Mason Neale, A History of the Holy Eastern Church: The Patriarchate of Alexandria:

(architecture, Christianity) The space anterior to the narthex of a church, sometimes roofed-over as with a porch, but more often an enclosed courtyard; in antiquity, the courtyard where catechumens were permitted to be close to the Eucharist, but forbidden to see it celebrated.


foo lion

A variant of foo dog reflecting that the animal depicted was intended to be a lion rather than a dog.


paternoster

/ˈpɑtəɹˌnɔstɚ/

From Middle English paternoster, pater noster, from Old English Paternoster, from Latin Pater noster (“our father”) (the first two words of the Oratio Dominica (“the Lord's prayer”)), from pater (“father”) + noster (“our”). The lift and the fishing equipment are named from their resemblance to a rosary.

(architecture, millwork) A bead-like ornament in mouldings.


Monterey

/ˌmɒntəˈɹeɪ/

Borrowed from Spanish Monterrey, from Galician Monterrei, from monte (“mountain”) + rei (“king”).

(architecture) Of a style reminiscent of the architecture of Alta California.


haunch

haunches (plural)
haunce (alternative)
haunse (alternative)
hanch (alternative)
hance (alternative)
hanse (alternative)

From Middle English haunche, hanche, from Old French hanche, hance, anche (compare French hanche, Italian anca), from a Germanic source, probably Frankish *ankijā, from Proto-Germanic *ankijǭ (“joint; ankle”), from Proto-Indo-European *ang- (“joint; lith”). Cognate with Old High German ancha, encha, einka (“the leg; joint, bend”) (compare Old High German anchila, enchila (“ankle”), German Hanke (“haunch”), West Frisian hancke (“haunch”). More at ankle.

der

(architecture) A squat vertical support structure.


haunch

en-verb

haunch (third-person singular simple present haunches, present participle haunching, simple past and past participle haunched)

haunches (present singular third-person)
haunching (participle present)
haunched (participle past)
haunched (past)
haunce (alternative)
haunse (alternative)
hanch (alternative)
hance (alternative)
hanse (alternative)

(transitive, architecture) To provide with a haunch or supporting structure.


gadroon

From French godron, from Middle French goderon, from a form of godet (“vase with wavy edges”) + -(e)ron, from Dutch kodde (“piece of cylindrical wood”). Also probably related to goder (“to pucker”).


ashlar

en-noun

ashlar (countable and uncountable, plural ashlars)

From Middle English assheler, acheler, etc., from forms of Old French esselier (“wooden support, traverse beam”), from Medieval Latin ascelāris and assellāris (equivalent to a diminutive of early forms of ais (“plank”)), variant of *axillāris (attested only after the Renaissance), from Latin axilla (“little plank”) + -āris (“-ary: forming adjectives”), from axis (“axle, plank”) + -illa (“-ella: forming diminutives”).

carreuada

well-finished masonry creating an effect similar to well-done wooden flooring

The four main spans across the waterway are carried on ashlar piers founded on Memel timber piles.

1949 November and December, “Notes and News: The High Level Bridge, Newcastle”, in Railway Magazine, page 407:

Even as I babbled, Jock's massy frame filled the doorway, his ill-hewn ashlar head weaving from side to side, eyes blinking at the light.

1973, Kyril Bonfiglioli, Don't Point That Thing at Me, Penguin, published 2001, page 108:

By the Augustan period, however, the old ashlar circuit with its earthen agger was beginning to be dismantled in some places.

2012, Seth G. Bernard, “Continuing the Deabte on Rome's Earliest Circuit Walls”, in Papers of the British School at Rome, number 80, page 2:

The building, in a plain Tudor Gothic style, has a central door in chamfered ashlar surround.

2024 March 6, Dr Joseph Brennan, “England's booking offices of distinction”, in RAIL, number 1004, page 59:

(architecture) Masonry employing flat and well-squared stone or brick, creating an appearance similar to wooden flooring.

And from the choir itself, where the big hoist was working, came the shouts of the men sweating at the great wheel that swung the cut stones skyward, and the men high overhead on the hurdle-walks, waiting to receive the swinging ashlars and guide them into place.

1970, Rosemary Sutcliff, The Witch`s Brat, Red Fox, published 1990, page 83:

(architecture) Stone hewn and finished to create such masonry, either completely or as a facade over an earthen or rubble core.

дя́лан ка́мък

well-finished stone intended for such work


filleting

(architecture) The protecting of a joint, as between roof and parapet wall, with mortar or cement, where flashing is employed in better work.


galilee

From late Middle English galilie, from Old French galilee, from Medieval Latin galilaea, from Latin Galilaea (“Galilee”). Possibly the allusion is to Galilee being an outlying region of Biblical Palestine.

(architecture) A narthex, particularly in the United Kingdom and the Church of England; a vestibule, a fully-enclosed yet porch-like structure, leading to the main body of an English ecclesiastical building.


gingerbread

en-noun

gingerbread (countable and uncountable, plural gingerbreads)

gingerbreads (plural)
gingebred (alternative Scotland)

/ˈd͡ʒɪn.(d͡)ʒəˌbɹɛd/

/ˈd͡ʒɪn.d͡ʒɚˌbɹɛd/

From Middle English gyngebred, gyngebrede, from Old French gingembras, gingimbrat (“preserved ginger”), from Medieval Latin *gingimbrātus (“gingered”, presumably referring to ginger that perhaps had a pharmaceutical use for some medicinal preparation), with the intrusive m added to gingiber, from Latin zingiber (“ginger”), of earlier Sanskrit origin, through Ancient Greek ζιγγίβερις (zingíberis). The third syllable was earlier confounded with bread, and the insertion of an r in the second syllable completed the semblance of a compound word: ginger + bread.

der

For a time modern architects took a starkly functional approach to the design of houses, emphasizing clean, uncluttered lines and rejecting most forms of wall ornamentation as dust-catching gingerbread.

1980, Robert M. Jones, editor, Walls and Ceilings, Time-Life Books, →ISBN, page 37:

(architecture) A flamboyant Victorian-era architectural style.


saltbox

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-saltbox.wav

[O]ne who had heard without seeing the application, would have mistaken the sound for that of a salt-box, in the hand of a dext'rous Merry Andrew, belonging to one of the booths at Bartholomew Fair.

1751, [Tobias] Smollett, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), London: Harrison and Co., […], →OCLC:

A similar box formerly used as a percussion instrument in burlesque music.


foursquare

en-noun

foursquare (countable and uncountable, plural foursquares)

From Middle English foure square; equivalent to four + square.

(countable, architecture, US) A boxy style of domestic architecture with four rooms to a floor, one of which is usually a stair hall.


tailing

[…]iron Bar forming a Tailing for the stones which lie in the doorways

1813, Benjamin Dean Wyatt, Observations on the Design for the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane:

(architecture) The part of a projecting stone or brick inserted in a wall.


glazing

glazing (countable and uncountable, plural glazings)

Inherited from Middle English glasynge; equivalent to glaze + -ing.

(architecture) All the windows of a building.


shouldering

(architecture) The process of bracing a load with a jutting structural member such as a corbel or bracket.


coping

From cope (sense 2), used in the sense "dress in a cope," "to cover."

Three chairs of the steamer type, all maimed, comprised the furniture of this roof-garden, with (by way of local color) on one of the copings a row of four red clay flower-pots filled with sun-baked dust […]

1914 November, Louis Joseph Vance, “An Outsider […]”, in Munsey’s Magazine, volume LIII, number II, New York, N.Y.: The Frank A[ndrew] Munsey Company, […], published 1915, →OCLC, chapter I (Anarchy), page 377, column 2:

He stood a moment at the coping, looking over a land of hard little bungalows with abnormally large porches, and new apartment-houses, small, but brave with variegated brick walls and terra-cotta trimmings.

(architecture) The top layer of a brick wall, especially one that slopes in order to throw off water.


pepperbox

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Large, stately, and dark was its [the château's] outline against the dusky night-sky; there were pepper-boxes and tourelles and what-not fantastically going up into the dim starlight.

1861, Elizabeth Gaskell, The Grey Woman:

(architecture) A tower capped by a cupola, looking similar to a giant pepper shaker.

I also remember the old Royal Mews that stood on the site of the present trumpery National Gallery, with its too suggestive pepper-boxes; […]

1887, Charles Mackay, Through the Long Day: Or, Memorials of a Literary Life, page 113:

Its architect, Wilkins, had the misfortune to be chosen to erect our much-abused National Gallery building, with its condemned "pepper-boxes" of cupolas; […]

2012, Edward Verrall Lucas, Highways and Byways in London:

(architecture, slang, chiefly in the plural) Any of the buildings of the Royal Academy and National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, London, having cupolas on the roof.


casita

Borrowed from Spanish casita (literally “small house”).

bor

Last fall, construction began on the new spa building with […] about 30 two-bedroom, free-standing casitas.

2007 May 11, Nick Kaye, “Icon Vallarta and Pronghorn”, in New York Times:

AARP, the research and advocacy behemoth, has begun aggressively promoting the spread of these units, often referred to as casitas or, more cheekily, granny flats.

[2023 September 6, Michelle Cottle, “The Magic of the Granny Flat”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(US) A small, attached but self-contained house or apartment.


fenestrated

en-adj

fenestrated (comparative more fenestrated, superlative most fenestrated)

more fenestrated (comparative)
most fenestrated (superlative)

Latin fenestro, from the noun fenestra (“window”).


wythe

Uncertain.
* Perhaps an alteration of width.
* Perhaps related to withe (“flexible twig; band of twigs”), from Old English wiþþe (“tie, band”).
The chimney-partition sense may derive from the fact that a single wythe or thickness of brick has often been used for such partitions.

A chimney runs from the base of the first flue liner to the top of the last flue liner, or to any rain cap above it. Attach single-wythe chimneys to the house.

1986, Jack Payne Jones, Handbook of Construction Contracting: Plans, specs, building, Craftsman Book Company, →ISBN, page 373:

[…] Where there is more than one flue, there is usually a single wythe of masonry separating the flues. Particularly on older chimneys with poor or missing caps, this wythe of brick dividing the flues may be[…]

2003, Carson Dunlop, Principles of Home Inspection: Chimneys & wood heating, Dearborn Real Estate, →ISBN, page 30:

(architecture) A partition between flues in a chimney.


foliate

en-verb

foliate (third-person singular simple present foliates, present participle foliating, simple past and past participle foliated)

foliates (present singular third-person)
foliating (participle present)
foliated (participle past)
foliated (past)

From Latin folium (“leaf”) + -ate (verb-forming suffix) (more at etymology 1)

af

All European architecture, bad and good, old and new, is derived from Greece through Rome, and coloured and perfected from the East. […] Now observe: those old Greeks gave the shaft; Rome gave the arch; the Arabs pointed and foliated the arch.

1851, John Ruskin, “The Quarry”, in The Stones of Venice, volume I (The Foundations), London: Smith, Elder, and Co., […], →OCLC, page 13:

(architecture) To decorate (an architectural feature, as an arch or window) with foils (“small arcs in the traceries of arches, windows, etc.”).

koristella viuhkakuviolla

to decorate (an architectural feature, as an arch or window) with foils


water table

(architecture) A molding or other projection in the wall of a building to throw off rainwater.


entourage

/ˈɒn.tʊ.ɹɑːʒ/

/ˈɑ̃ː.tʊ.ɹɑːʒ/

/ˈɑn.tə.ɹɑʒ/

Unadapted borrowing from French entourage, from entourer (“to surround”).

ubor

(architecture) Decorations, such as people, vehicles, or trees, appearing on an architectural sketch or rendering to make the site look more lively.


embattled

en-adj

embattled (comparative more embattled, superlative most embattled)

more embattled (comparative)
most embattled (superlative)

From embattle (“to furnish with battlements”) + -ed.

suffix

The lofty towers of the Castle overhang the western approach to the Bridge, and the line passes into Conway through an opening pierced in the embattled wall, which entirely surrounds the town. These fortifications are in good preservation, and rank among the most perfect examples of the strongholds of the thirteenth century.

1850, Edwin Clark, “The Masonry and Scaffolding”, in The Britannia and Conway Tubular Bridges. […], volume II, London: […] Day and Son, […]; and John Weale, […], →OCLC, section VI (Details of Construction of the Bridges), page 534:

(architecture) Of a fortress or other building, a wall, etc.: having battlements or crenellations; battlemented, crenellated.

forsynet med skydeskår

of a fortress, etc.: having battlements or crenellations


space frame

(architecture) A three-dimensional truss, often of steel, forming a rigid, stable structure

空間桁架 /空间桁架

a three-dimensional truss, often of steel, forming a rigid, stable structure


cresting

The station also boasts a large semi-domed French pavilion roof with fish-scale tiles and iron cresting, plus a rectangular hall with arcaded upper storey and wooden lantern.

2022 January 12, Paul Bigland, “Fab Four: the nation's finest stations: Eastbourne”, in RAIL, number 948, page 27:

(architecture) An ornamental finish on the top of a wall or ridge of a roof.


functionalism

en-noun

functionalism (countable and uncountable, plural functionalisms)

/ˈfʌŋkʃənəlɪzəm/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-functionalism.wav

(architecture) A doctrine, in several fields, that the function of something should be reflected in its design and the materials used in its construction.


ancon

From Latin ancōn, from Ancient Greek ἀγκών (ankṓn, “bend, elbow, cranny”).

der

(architecture) A console that appears to support a cornice.


laquear

these were the panels proper of the laquear or fretted ceiling.

1903, Suetonius, Gai Suetoni Tranquilli De Vita Caesarum, Libri III-VI, page 298:

Gradus in quo lector stat, Amp. I, V. 381, it is clear that the ambo, which is meant by it, was to a certain extent an imitation of the laquear in Solomon's temple .

1919, Leo Wiener, Contributions Towards a History of Arabico-Gothic Culture, page 351:

The sunk or hollow compartments, which form the laquear of this depressed vault, differ considerably in shape and arrangement from those which were adopted when it was finally rejected.

2022, John Addington Symonds, The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti:


cortile

(architecture) An internal courtyard, surrounded by walls but open to the sky


anta

Learned borrowing from Latin antae (“pilasters”), with a back-formed singular form.

lbor

(architecture) A kind of pier that terminates the walls of the naos, a kind of post or pillar on either side of a doorway or entrance of a Greek temple.


Adamesque

en-adj

Adamesque (comparative more Adamesque, superlative most Adamesque)

more Adamesque (comparative)
most Adamesque (superlative)

Samuel McIntyre, famed for his distinctive and delicate version of the English Adamesque style.

2004, Carolyn K. Tolles, Bryant Franklin Tolles - Architecture in Salem: An Illustrated Guide:

(architecture) In the style of Robert Adam (1728–1792), Scottish neoclassical architect.


necking

en-noun

necking (countable and uncountable, plural neckings)


bague

Borrowed from French bague (“ring”). Doublet of bee.

(architecture) The annular moulding or group of mouldings dividing a long shaft or clustered column into two or more parts.


surmounted

(architecture) Of an arch or dome: rising higher than a semicircle.


weathered

en-adj

weathered (comparative more weathered, superlative most weathered)

more weathered (comparative)
most weathered (superlative)

(architecture) Made slightly sloping, so as to throw off water.


channeled

channeled (comparative more channeled, superlative most channeled)

more channeled (comparative)
most channeled (superlative)

(architecture) Having channels or flutings.


pisé

From French pisé, from piser (“to stamp, pound”).

The above method of forming Pisé walling is different from the mode of building common in Devonshire and the West of England

(architecture) A kind of wall made of stiff earth or clay rammed in between moulds which are carried up as the wall rises.


orle

From Old French (also modern) orle, from orler (“to hem”), or from Vulgar Latin *orula, a diminutive of Latin ora (“edge”), probably from os, oris (“mouth”).

(architecture) A fillet under the ovolo of a capital.


bartisan

bartisans (plural)
bartizan (alternative)

Borrowed by the Scottish novelist Walter Scott (see quotation) from Middle Scots bartisan, variant of bartising, from Middle English bretasynge. Doublet of bratticing.

she soon found it had no communication with any other part of the battlements, being an isolated bartisan, or balcony, secured, as usual, by a parapet, with embrasures, at which a few archers might be stationed for defending the turret, and flanking with their shot the wall of the castle on that side.

1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter X, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 165:

There were flambeaux on staggering poles every ten strides or so, and at intervals of about a hundred strides, bartizans whose guardroom windows glared like fireworks clung to the bridge piers.

1980, Gene Wolfe, chapter XIV, in The Shadow of the Torturer (The Book of the New Sun; 1), New York: Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, pages 131–132:

(architecture) A parapet with battlements projecting from the top of a tower in a castle or church.


cincture

/ˈsɪŋk.t͡ʃɚ/

From Latin cinctūra. Cognate with Spanish cintura (“waist”). Doublet of ceinture.

(architecture) The fillet, listel, or band next to the apophyge at the extremity of the shaft of a column.

caiseal (colúin)

(architecture) the fillet, listel, or band next to the apophyge at the extremity of the shaft of a column


opisthodomos

Borrowed from Ancient Greek ὀπισθόδομος (opisthódomos, “back room”), from ὄπισθεν (ópisthen) + δόμος (dómos).

bor

(Greek architecture) A porch at the rear of a temple, set against the blank back wall of the cella.


Moorish

en-adj

Moorish (comparative more Moorish, superlative most Moorish)

more Moorish (comparative)
most Moorish (superlative)

Mar-a-Lago was quiet three days before Thanksgiving. Donald Trump’s Moorish palace seemed all but deserted late that morning, the seaside estate’s cavernous living room traversed intermittently by a junior staffer or silent aide.

2024 December 12, Eric Cortellessa, “Donald Trump 2024 TIME Person of the Year”, in Time:

(architecture) Of or pertaining to a style of Spanish and Portuguese architecture from the time of the Moors, characterized by the horseshoe arch and ornate, geometric decoration.

maurilainen

of or pertaining to architecture of Moors in Spain


foo dog

Possibly a Western invention, from Mandarin 福 (fú, “good fortune”) + English dog. There is no similar word in Chinese itself that uses the word 福 (fú), but see English foo and Foo. Compare also Chinese 佛 (“Buddha”), pronounced fo or fu in some varieties.

A stylized lion statue similar to those usually placed in male and female pairs outside imperial Chinese palaces, tombs, temples, etc.


denticulate

Each is embellished with Italian Renaissance-inspired detail, including rusticated stonework, pedimented window hoods, consoles, cartouches, a denticulate cornice and a roof-mounted balustrade

2001, Ray McDevitt, Courthouses of California, page 330:

(architecture) Having dentils or denticules.


miserere

From Middle English miserere, a borrowing from Latin miserēre (“have pity”), first word of the 51st Psalm (50th in the older Greek and Latin numbering), translating Ancient Greek ἐλέησον (eléēson) and Biblical Hebrew חָנֵּנִי (ḥānnēnî), inflected form of חָנַן (ḥānan, “have mercy”).

(architecture) A small projecting boss or bracket on the underside of the hinged seat of a church stall, intended to give some support to a standing worshipper when the seat is turned up; a misericord.


bahut

Borrowed from French bahut, of unknown origin.

(obsolete, architecture) A dwarf-wall of plain masonry, carrying the roof of a cathedral or church and masked or hidden behind the balustrade.


quartering

(architecture) A series of quarters, or small upright posts.


bracketing

(architecture) A series or group of brackets; brackets, collectively.


barrel roof

(architecture) A roof having a semicircular cross section; used to span large distances in railway stations etc


triplex

From Latin triplex. Analyzable as tri- + -plex.

Having three parts; triple or threefold.

(architecture) Having three units, divisions, suites, apartments


apodyterium

en-noun

apodyterium (plural apodyteriums or apodyteria)

apodyteriums (plural)
apodyteria (plural)

/ˌæpədaɪˈtɪəɹi.əm/

From Latin, from Ancient Greek ἀποδυτήριον (apodutḗrion), from ἀποδύω (apodúō, “strip oneself”).

(architecture, historical) The apartment at the entrance of the baths, or in the palestra, for getting undressed.

apodytère

the apartment at the entrance of the baths, or in the palestra, for getting undressed


bed-mould

(architecture) The congeries of mouldings which is under the projecting part of almost every cornice, of which, indeed, it is a part.


cyclostyle

From cyclo- + style (as in stylus). Late 19th century.

(architecture) A circular group of columns without a core.


sphaeristerium

(architecture) A large open space connected with the Ancient Roman thermae, for exercise with balls after the bather had been anointed.


rooftop

there may be snow on the rooftop but there is fire in the furnace

The house itself was a mound of red baked bricks and a tin rooftop.

2012, Ernest Alanki, The Chocolate Shop Perverts:

The top layer of a roof; the material covering or composing a roof.


colonnaded

en-adj

colonnaded (comparative more colonnaded, superlative most colonnaded)

more colonnaded (comparative)
most colonnaded (superlative)

But the troubles at Credit Suisse — whose colonnaded headquarters in Zurich are more than 5,800 miles from Silicon Valley Bank’s base in California — are separate and largely of its own making.

2023 March 15, Michael J. de la Merced, Maureen Farrell, “Credit Suisse to Borrow Up to $54 Billion From Central Bank”, in The New York Times:

(architecture) Having one or more colonnades.


interceptor

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(architecture, engineering) A device to trap, remove, or separate hazardous or undesirable matter (such as oil or sand) from normal waste conveyed through it, permitting normal sewage or liquid wastes to discharge into the disposal terminal by gravity.


feathering

en-noun

feathering (countable and uncountable, plural featherings)

(architecture) An arrangement of small arcs or foils separated by projecting cusps, frequently forming the feather-like ornament on the inner mouldings of arches.


saddleback

(architecture) A coping that is thicker in the middle than at the edges.


skeiling

Skeilings are found across southern England, in regions like Sussex, Cornwall, and the Isle of Wight and Channel Islands.

(architecture) A straight sloped part of a ceiling, such as on the underside of a pitched roof.


fenestration

fenestration (countable and uncountable, plural fenestrations)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-fenestration.wav

(architecture) The arrangement of windows and similar openings in a building.

aukkojen sijoittelu

arrangement of windows etc in a building


apside

Back-formation from apsides, from Ancient Greek ἁψῖδες (hapsîdes, “apsides”), plural of ἁψίς (hapsís).


intrados

en-noun

intrados (plural intradoses or intrados)

From French, from Latin intra (“within”) + French dos (“back”) (from Latin dostrum).

* Application of stitching bars to intrados (inner arch) though cracked voussoirs, grout and apply crack injection to seal.

2020 May 20, Philip Haigh, “Ribblehead: at the heart of the S&C's survival and its revival: Ribblehead Viaduct repairs”, in Rail, page 27:

(architecture) The inner curve of an arch or vault.


extrados

extrados (plural extradoses or extrados)

From French extradossé (“outer curve”) from Latin extra (“outside”) + dos (“back”) (from Latin dorsum).

The two lower rows of tubes at each end pier were then drilled through to the extrados of the brickwork to act as weep holes and assist in the drainage from the backs of the arches.

1954 January, “Strengthening of Coquet Viaduct”, in Railway Magazine, page 19:

(architecture) The outer or upper curve of an arch.


postern

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-postern.wav

From Old French posterne, alteration of posterle, from Late Latin posterula (“back door”), from Latin posterus (“later”).

And as they cam hurlyng vnder the Castel where as sir launcelot lay in wyndowe / & sawe how two knyghtes layd vpon syr Blyaunt with their swerdes /[…]/ And thenne sir launcelot brake the chaynes fro his legges and of his armes /[…]/ & so sir launcelot ran out at a posterne / and there he mett with the two knyȝtes that chaced sir Blyaunt

1485, Sir Thomas Malory, “ij”, in Le Morte Darthur, book XII:

He by a privy postern took his flight.

1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VI”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 52:

Out at the postern, by the abbey wall.

c. 1590–1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Two Gentlemen of Verona”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]:

The Duke of Argyle led the way in silence to the small postern by which they had been admitted into Richmond Park, so long the favourite residence of Queen Caroline. It was opened by the same half-seen janitor, and they found themselves beyond the precincts of the royal demesne.

1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter I, in Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume IV, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC, page 3:

(architecture) A back gate, back door, side entrance, or other gateway distinct from the main entrance, especially in a city wall or fortification.


balteus

Borrowed from Latin balteus (“belt, girdle”).

bor+

(architecture) An Ionic ornamental band encircling the pulvinus, or bolster of the capital.


internationalism

en-noun

internationalism (usually uncountable, plural internationalisms)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-internationalism.wav

(architecture) A major architectural style that was developed in the 1920s and 1930s and was closely related to modernism, characterized by lightweight industrial materials, lack of ornamentation, and flat surfaces.


naos

naoses (plural)
naosoi (plural)
naoi (plural)

From Ancient Greek ναός (naós, “inner part of the temple”).

borrowed

The simplest form of the rectangular temple was that in which the two side walls were carried out from the naos to form the porch at one or both extremities of the building.

1846, Henry Ellis, The Elgin and Phigaleian marbles of the classical ages, in the British museum:

The uncertainty that exists, from the condition of the ruins, as to the height originally assigned by the architect to the interior of the naos and of the opisthodomus,^([sic – meaning opisthodomos]) hampers our investigation of the considerations by which he decided the distribution of the plan.

1868, William Watkiss Lloyd, On the General Theory of Proportion in Architectural Design, John Weale, page 18:

The interior breadth of the naos of the temple as octastyle may, therefore, be deduced within very narrow limits of error;[…].

1888, H. H. Statham, editor, The Builder, Volume 54, page 114:

(historical, architecture) The inner part of an ancient Greek temple, containing a statue of the temple's deity and surrounded by a colonnaded portico; (by extension) the Roman cella, which it later gave rise to.


firms

(obsolete, architecture) The principal rafters of a roof, especially a pair of rafters taken together.


stained glass

en-noun

stained glass (usually uncountable, plural stained glasses)

(architecture) The use of such glass to construct decorative windows, especially in churches.


pilaster

pilasters (plural)
pilastre (alternative)

From Middle French pilastre, from Italian pilastro. Equivalent to pillar + -aster.

(decorative architecture) A rectangular column that projects partially from the wall to which it is attached; it gives the appearance of a support, but is only for decoration.

(structural architecture) A column or short wing wall attached to the foundation wall which provides lateral support, or to support a vertical load that does not fall on the foundation wall.


pronaos

From Ancient Greek πρόναος (prónaos, “vestibule of a church”).

uder

(architecture) The inner area of the portico of a Greek or Roman temple

prónaos

the inner area of the portico of a Greek or Roman temple


entablature

From Italian intavolatura, from in + tavola (“table”).

In the midst was one immense cedar, worthy to have been a summer palace on Lebanon; beneath, sheltered by its huge boughs from the sun, was a well, whose square marble walls were covered with the entablatures of the Roman days,—oval compartments of figures, surrounded by a carved wreath of the palm.

1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XII, in Romance and Reality. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 239:

(architecture) All of that part of a classical temple above the capitals of the columns; includes the architrave, frieze, and cornice but not the roof.


quatrefoil

quatrefoils (plural)
quadrefoil (alternative)
quarterfoil (alternative archaic)
quaterfoil (alternative archaic)

/kætɹəˌfɔɪl/

From Old French quatrefoil, from quatre (“four”) + foil (“leaf”).

It was a narrow, gravelled island we had to lie on, guarded by glazed brick chimneys and, running along the sides, a prickly little gothic fence of iron finials and terracotta quatrefoils.

1988, Alan Hollinghurst, The Swimming-Pool Library, paperback edition, London: Penguin Books, →ISBN, page 142:

(architecture) A symmetrical shape that forms the overall outline of four partially-overlapping circles of the same diameter.


bridging

All the joists and bridgings of the mezzanine floor to have stout double herringbone strutting not more than 6 feet apart.

1860, Thomas Leverton Donaldson, William Cunningham Glen, Handbook of Specifications, page 319:

(architecture) The system of bracing used between floor or other timbers to distribute the weight.


permastone

Originally a trade name, from perma- + stone.

Any superficial surface constructed to look like stonework, usually made of concrete or thin sheets of rock assembled over an existing surface.


raiser

(architecture) The upright board on the front of a step in a flight of steps.


pendent

en-adj

pendent (comparative more pendent, superlative most pendent)

more pendent (comparative)
most pendent (superlative)

From Middle English pendaunt, Anglo-Norman pendaunt, pendant, respelled to reflect Latin pendēns, pendentis, present participle of pendere (“to hang, to be suspended”). Compare pendant, which retained the spelling.

(architecture, of a structure) Either hanging in some sense, or constructed of multiple elements such as the voussoirs of an arch or the pendentives of a dome, none of which can stand on its own, but which in combination are stable.


Parthenon

/ˈpɑːɹθənɑːn/

From Ancient Greek Παρθενών (Parthenṓn), from παρθενών (parthenṓn, “women's chamber”), from παρθένος (parthénos, “virgin; young woman”).

An ancient temple to Athena and monument in the city of Athens. It is a symbol of Greek achievement in the arts and of Athenian democracy.


columnated

columnated (comparative more columnated, superlative most columnated)

more columnated (comparative)
most columnated (superlative)


structural research

(architecture) A field of research and analysis in architecture that uses studies and details from nature or other sources to produce or create a new structure. It is used in design and architecture to imitate structures and improve them giving them a certain amount of art feeling. Structural research can be also called structural art or structural design.


hypocaust

From Latin hypocaustum, from Ancient Greek ὑπόκαυστον (hupókauston), from Ancient Greek ὑπό (hupó, “underneath”) + καίειν (kaíein, “to light a fire, burn”).

An underfloor heating system, even without such an underfloor space or flue, as adapted for modern housing.


belvedere

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-belvedere.wav

Borrowed from Italian belvedere (literally “fair view”).

bor

“One evening,” she went on, “while Madame Orio was fast asleep in her little belvedere (it being the good old lady's habit to repair there to rest after a bottle or two of red Padua wine), Manette and Marton left the widow's house noiselessly in the Campo San Zobenigo, and made their way running towards the Piazza of St. Mark's.”

1919, Ronald Firbank, Valmouth, hardback edition, Duckworth, page 57:

The most important thing, she reflected, as she stood on the balcony of the Mairie which formed a most useful belvedere over the town, was to make her appearance as commonplace and down at heel as possible […].

1982, Lawrence Durrell, Constance, Faber & Faber, published 2004, page 761:

Three castellated (with battlements) towers stand sentry here, with one being particularly large. This is said to have been used by Rhodes as a belvedere, and (according to some sources) by railway staff for some time after opening.

2020 August 26, Tim Dunn, “Great railway bores of our time!”, in Rail, page 46:

(architecture) A turret or other raised structure offering a pleasant view of the surrounding area.


apsidal

(architecture, astronomy) Of, pertaining to, or in the form of an apse or apsis

absidal

of, pertaining to, or in the form of an apse


fluting

(architecture, sculpture) A decoration consisting of parallel, normally vertical, flutes (grooves) incised into the surface.


hatchway

Up through the great hatchways rimmed with racks of heavy shot, the watch below came pouring […]

1924, Herman Melville, chapter 22, in Billy Budd, London: Constable & Co.:

A means of passing through a wall or floor, having a hatch (especially on a ship); a doorway with a hatch rather than a door.


terrazzo

en-noun

terrazzo (countable and uncountable, plural terrazzos)

terrazzos (plural)
terrazo (alternative)

A fibreglass fish should have been spewing water into a terrazzo fountain, but the pipes had not yet been connected and bags of cement were heaped in the basin.

1977, John Le Carré, The Honourable Schoolboy, Folio Society, published 2010, page 265:

Richard Sammons[…] began by leaving the ground floor studio pretty much as he found it, with 15-foot ceilings and a black terrazzo floor.

2007 January 4, Fred A. Bernstein, “Art Above and Below, With Life in the Middle”, in New York Times:

(architecture) A faux-marble material used for flooring and countertops.


aulic

en-adj

aulic (comparative more aulic, superlative most aulic)

more aulic (comparative)
most aulic (superlative)

From Latin aulicus (“of a prince's court”), from aula (“royal court”), from Ancient Greek αὐλή (aulḗ, “courtyard”).

The basic structure of the villa is aulic, with perpendicular rooms at either end of the main hall.

2004, Michael Kulikowski, Late Roman Spain and Its Cities, page 303:

(architecture) Of, pertaining to, or resembling a palace.


decani

Borrowed from Latin decānī (“of the dean”).

You want a few more daffs on the decani side […]

1934, Dorothy L. Sayers, The Nine Tailors:

(church architecture) Of the side of the chancel, apse, altar or choir on which the dean's stall is placed (the right hand side to a person facing the altar); decanal.


impluvium

en-noun

impluvium (plural impluviums or impluvia)

Latin impluvium, from impluit (“rains upon”)

(architecture) A low basin in the center of a household atrium, into which rainwater flowed down from the roof through the compluvium.


waterleaf

Hydrophyllaceae
Hydrophyllum
Talinum fruticosum
Waterleaf (architecture)

waterleaf (plural waterleafs or waterleaves)

waterleafs (plural)
waterleaves (plural)
water-leaf (alternative)

(architecture) A leaf-shaped decoration used on the capitals of columns in late 12th-century Romanesque architecture


kremlin

Similar forms are attested, per Vasmer's Etymological Dictionary, in earlier German Kremelin and French Cremlin, which are theorized to come from Old East Slavic кремльнъ (kremlĭnŭ, “having a kremlin”), from кремль (kremlĭ), whence Russian кремль (kremlʹ).

uder

9% of historical parks are the gardens of monasteries and kremlins (fortified centres in the towns), 8% are urban ("public") gardens and only 2% are parks on urban estates.

1997, Council of Europe, Cultural Policy in the Russian Federation, page 107:

Several cities in Russia were built around fortresses called kremlins. Russians built kremlins for defense during the Middle Ages. A kremlin was often located along a river.

2012, Britannica Student Encyclopedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc, page 87:

The centre of the kremlin usually held the prince's or voivode’s court, the cathedral, and the bishop's court. This arrangement can be seen in quite a number of 16th-century kremlins. The main street of the kremlin connected this complex with the gate leading to the marketplace.

2012, Konstantin Nossov, Russian Fortresses 1480-1682, page 45:

(architecture, Slavic architecture) A fortified, central complex found in various Russian cities.


open-plan

en-adj

open-plan (comparative more open-plan, superlative most open-plan)

more open-plan (comparative)
most open-plan (superlative)

(architecture) Having large rooms with few dividing barriers such as partitions.

Großraum- (in compounds like Großraumbüro)


outwork

en-noun

outwork (countable and uncountable, plural outworks)

Beyond the castle, scattered outworks offered some protection for the farther-flung peasants.

(architecture, countable) A minor, subsidiary fortification built beyond the main limits of fortification.

ܚܣܢܐ

a minor, subsidiary fortification built beyond the main limits of fortification


corbie step

corbie steps (plural)
corbie-step (alternative)
corbiestep (alternative)
corbel-step (alternative)

It is a great red-brick house - that is, the front is of brick, with corbie steps on the gables and a text over the door; but the courtyard into which the omnibus drives is of black and white 'cage-work' in wood and plaster.

1904, Montague Rhodes James, Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, number 13:

(architecture) One of a series of step-like projections at the top of a gable.


springer

A stone at the base of an arch (from which the arch springs).


GRP

GRP (countable and uncountable, plural GRPs)

(architecture) Initialism of glass-reinforced plastic.


chapiter

From Middle English chapitre, from Old French chapitre, from Latin capitulum, diminutive of caput (“head”). Doublet of chapter and capitulum.

Also he made before the house two pillars of thirty and five cubits high, and the chapiter that was on the top of each of them was five cubits.

1891, Albert Gallatin Mackey, Manual of the Lodge, page 70:

(architecture) The capital or uppermost part of a column, upon which the roof and its decorations are supported.


tambour

tambour (countable and uncountable, plural tambours)

Borrowed from French tambour (“drum”), from Arabic طُنْبُور (ṭunbūr), from the Middle Persian ancestor of Classical Persian تنبور (tanbūr). Doublet of tabor. Compare Armenian տաւիղ (tawiġ), and tabla.

(architecture) Synonym of drum (“cylindrical stone in the shaft of a column”).


knop

From Middle English knop, from Middle Low German and Middle Dutch knoppe, from Proto-Germanic *knuppô, *knuppaz, *knappô, which is perhaps related to *knappō (“knob, boy”). Possible doublet of knave and knob.

In the three upper elements, the knop-finial-fillet, both masters use all three squares from the base plan forming widths of 1:2:√2 (another pleasing rhythm). In the gable over the window the finials have width in the ratio of √2:4:2. The elements on the pinnacle relate to those on the gable as 1:√2, 1:2 and √2:2.

2007, John James, In Search of the Unknown in Medieval Architecture, Pindar Press, →ISBN, page 438:

(architecture) A finial, or swelling termination


sile

siles (plural)
syle (alternative)
cyle (alternative)

From Middle English syle, from Old English sȳl (“column, pillar, support”), from Proto-West Germanic *sūli, from Proto-Germanic *sūliz (“beam, post, column, pillar”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱsewl-, *ḱswel- (“log”), from *ḱsew-, *ḱes- (“to scratch, comb”).
Cognate with Dutch zuil (“pillar”), German Säule (“column, pillar”), Norwegian søyle (“pillar”), Icelandic súla (“column”), Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌿𐌻𐍃 (sauls, “pillar”).

inh

(now chiefly dialectal) A column; pillar.

(now chiefly dialectal) A beam; rafter; one of the principal rafters of a building.

(now chiefly dialectal) The foot or lower part of a couple or rafter; base.


sile

en-verb

sile (third-person singular simple present siles, present participle siling, simple past and past participle siled)

siles (present singular third-person)
siling (participle present)
siled (participle past)
siled (past)

From Middle English silen, sylen, from Middle Low German silen ("to let off water, filter, strain"; > Low German silen, sielen), equivalent to sie (“to filter, strain”) + -le. Cognate with German sielen (“let off water, filter”), Swedish sila (“to strain, filter, sift”), German Siel (“drain, sewer, sluice”).

cog

(intransitive, UK dialectal) To flow down; drip; drop; fall; sink.


lightwell

In it a covered porch and vestibule were backed by a vertical shaft or "light-well," which served as a great window both to the vestibule itself, and to the corridors, staircases, and landings that connected it with the upper stories.

1907, Ronald M. Burrows, The Discoveries In Crete, page 80:

The sliding glass door with its rolled-up blinds looked onto a lightwell, composed of a glass platform overhead and carefully angled mirrors that were reflecting a confusing cold light into the bedroom.

2017, Kamila Shamsie, Home Fire, Bloomsbury (2018), page 240:

(architecture) An open shaft that transmits light from above into a staircase or an inner room.

celobert

an open shaft that transmits light from above into a room


voussoir

Unadapted borrowing from French voussoir, from Old French vosoir, from Vulgar Latin *volsorium, from *volsus, from Latin volvō (“I roll”).

ubor

It is the voussoir depth in a real arch which enables the arch to carry wider ranges of loading; a large number of different idealized centre-line arches can be contained within a given practical profile. ...[T]his must be so, or no mediaeval bridge would have survived its decentering.

1977, Jaques Heyman, Equilibrium of Shell Structures, Clarendon Press, Oxford, page 2:

Other areas have mortar joints missing, including between the voussoir blocks forming the edge of the arches on either side of the pier.

2020 May 20, Philip Haigh, “Ribblehead: at the heart of the S&C's survival and its revival: Ribblehead Viaduct repairs”, in RAIL, page 26:

(architecture) One of a series of wedge-shaped bricks or stones forming an arch or vault.


sedilia

Latin, plural of sedile (“seat, bench”).

(obsolete or historical, architecture) A series of seats, typically three, often recessed into the wall, on the south side of the chancel or choir, reserved for the use of officiating clergy.


lattice window

(architecture) a window with strips of metal holding small pieces of glass


gambrel

Uncertain, perhaps from Old Northern French gamberel, from gambe (“leg”).


astragal

From Ancient Greek ἀστράγαλος (astrágalos). Doublet of astragalus.

(architecture) A semicircular molding separating the architrave at the top or bottom of a column.

(architecture) A molding attached to double doors to prevent drafts.


trimmer

(architecture) A beam into which are framed the ends of headers in floor framing, as when a hole is to be left for stairs, or to avoid bringing joists near chimneys.