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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1832 Excerpt:...But triangular, circular, or polygonal pedestals, or such as are swelled aid have their die in the form of a bajluster, or are surrounded with cinctures, are, in no case, to be made use of in buildings. Such extravagances, though frequent in some foreign countries, are now laid aside wherever good taste prevails. A pedestal, like a column or an entablature, is composed of three principal parts, which are the base, the body, or the die, and the cornice. The die is always nearly of the same figure, being constantly either a cube or a parallelopiped; but the base and cornice are varied, and adorned with more or less mouldings, according to the simplicity or richness of the composition in which the pedestal is employed. Hence pedestals are, like columns, distinguished by the names of Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Composite and Corinthian. Some authors are very averse to pedestals, and com. pare a column raised on a pedestal to a man mounted on stilts, imagining that they were first introduced merely through necessity, and for want of columns of a sufficient length. It does not seem proper to suppose that they were first introduced merely through want of columns of a sufficient length, since there are many occasions on which they are evidently necessary, and some in which the order? were it not so raised, would lose much of its beautiful appearance. Thus within our churches, if the columns supporting the vault were placed immediately on the ground, the seats would hide their bases and a good part of the shafts; and in the theatres of the ancients, if the columns of the scene had been placed immediately on the stage, the actors would have hid a considerable part of them from the audience; for which reason it was usual to raise ihem on very high pedestals, as was likewise...