Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 2.djvu/529

Rh GLOSSARY.] 1 structed of small oak trees, 6 or 7 inches square, roughly trimmed by the axe ; the girders, &c. , are larger, but seldom seem to have been sawn. The framing of the lower story generally stands on a sort of plinth or bahut of stone or brick, sometimes as high as the window sills, and the other fronts are each framed separately; and as the joists of .each story project over those of that below, each story also projects, till, in narrow streets, it is said the houses almost touched each other at the top. To strengthen the framing, it was customary to tie the angles together with circular braces cut out of the cro6ked boughs of trees, and to fill in under and sometimes over the window openings with cross struts, sometimes like the St Andrew s cross, and sometimes in circles and various designs. The main posts also were streng thened inside and out with a sort of projecting corbels, called in French liens or tUcharges, and by us spcrvcrs, which helped to cnrry the projecting plates above. In the better sort of work these timbers are chamfered and sometimes carved, and the gables have rich barge boards ; the roofs invariably have great projec tions to throw off the wet, and the jutting of the stories, one over the other, no doubt was intended for the same purpose. Old post and pane work is put together with mortices and tenons pinned with pins or trunnels of hard wood ; very often there is not a nail in the whole construction. The intermediate upright posts or quarters were called prick posts. All these houses are plastered, rough cast, or pargetted between the timbers, some times in handsome designs ; and as the old oak gets black with age, or as the timbers are often rubbed over with oil, and the plaster whited, they are called in England black and while hoicses. (See PARGETTING and PLASTERING.) Several churches in Essex have post and pane work. POSTERN, a small gateway in the enceinte of a castle, abbey, &c. , from which to issue and enter unobserved. They are often called Sally Ports. POSTICUM (Lat.) A portico behind a temple. (See PORTICUS and PORTICO.) PRECEPTORY, a small establishment of the Knights Templars, managed by a preceptor, a subordinate officer to a master, in the same way as a priory was by a prior, and not an abbot. PRESBYTERY (Lat. presbyteriutn, Ital. prcsbiterio, Fr. presbytire), a word applied to various parts of large churches in a very ambiguous way. Some consider it to be the choir itself ; others, what is now- named the sacrarium. Traditionally, however, it seems to be applied to the vacant space between the back of the high altar and the entrance to the lady chapel, as at Lincoln and Chichester ; in other words, the Back or Retro Choir. PRICK POSTS, an old name given sometimes to the queen posts of a roof, and sometimes to the lilling in quarters in framing. (See POST and PANE.) PRIORY, a monastic establishment, generally in connection with an abbey, and presided over by a prior, who was a subordinate to the abbot, and held much the same relation to that dignitary as a dean does to a bishop. (See ABBEY.) PROCESSION PATH (Lat. ambitus templi), the route taken by proces sions on solemn days in large churches up the north aisle, round behind the high altar, down the south aisle, and then up the centre of the nave. I RONAOS (Gr. irp6, before, and va6s, a temple), the inner portico of a temple, or the space between the porticus, or outer portico, and the door opening into the cella. This is a conventional use of the term ; for, strictly, the pronaos is the portico itself. PROPYL.EUM (Gr. irp&, before, and TTUATJ, a portal), any structure or structures forming the entrance to the peribolus of a temple .; also the space lying between the entrance and the temple. In common usage this term in the plural (propyltea) is almost restricted to the entrance to the Acropolis of Athens, which is known by it as a name. T.he form propylon occurs in the Latin of Vitruvius. PROSCENIUM, the stage in ancient theatres. PROSTYLE (Gr. irpi, before, and &amp;lt;rrvos, a column), a portico in which the columns project from the building to which it is attached. PSEUDO-DIPTERAL (Gr. x^uSfc, false, and DIPTEROS, q.v. false double-winged. &quot;When the inner row of columns of a dipteral arrangement is omitted and the space from the wall of the building to the columns is preserved, it is pseudo-dipteral. The portico of University College, London, is psendo-dipterally arranged, the returning columns on the ends or sides not being carried through behind &quot;those in front. PSEUDO-PERIPTERAL (Gr.^euSrjs, false, and PERIPTF.ROS, q.v.), false- winged. A tern pie having the columns on its flanks attached to the walls, instead of being arranged as in a pcripteros, is said to be a pseudo-peripteral. PUI.PIT (Fr. chaire de Tiglisc, Ital. pulpito, Ger. KanzcT), a raised platform with enclosed front, whence sermons, homilies, &c., were delivered. Pulpits were probably derived in their modern form from the ambones in the early Christian church. There are many old pulpits of stone, though the minority are of wood. Those in V B C H I T E C T U E E 471 churches are generally hexagonal or octagonal ; and some stand on stone bases, and others on slender wooden stems, like columns. The designs vary according to the periods in which they wero erected, having panelling, tracery, cnspings, crockets, and other ornaments then in use. Some are extremely rich, and ornamented with colour and gilding. A few also have fine canopies or sounding-boards. Their usual place is in the nave, mostly on the north side, against the second pier from the chancel arch. Pulpits for addressing the people in the open air were common in the mediaeval period, and stood near a road or cross. Thus there was one at Spital Fields, and one at St Paul s, London. External pulpits still remain at Magdalene College, Oxford, and at Shrewsbury. Pulpits, or rather places for. reading during the meals of the monks, are found in the refectories at Chester, Beaulieu, Shrewsbury, &c., in England; and at St Martin des Champs, St Germain des Pies, &c., in France; also in the cloisters at St Die and St Lo. Shortly after the Reformation the canons ordered pulpits to be erected in all churches where there were none before. It is supposed that to this circumstance we owe so many of the time of Elizabeth and James. Many of them are very beautifully and elaborately carved, and are evi dently of Flemish workmanship. The pulpits in the Mahometan mosques are quite different in form, being usually canopied and approached by a straight flight of steps. These have a doorway at the foot, with an architrave, and boldly moulded head ; the whole of the work to this and to the stairs, parapet, and pulpit itself being of wood, richly inlaid, and often in part gorgeously painted and gilt. PULVINATED (Lat. pulvimis, a cushion or bolster), a term used to express the swelling or bolstering of the frieze which is found in some of the inferior works of the Roman school, and is common in Italian practice. It is used indifferently with pillowed. PYCNOSTYLE (Gr. -tniKv6s, dense, and a-rvXos, a column), having columns thickly set. The space or intercolumniation implied by this term is one diameter and a half. (See EUSTYLE.) QUARREL, QUARRY (from the French carre, square), any square- shaped opening ; applied in the Beauchamp Roll to the quatre- foils in Perpendicular windows, sometimes to squares of paving, but most commonly to the lozenge-shaped pieces of glass in lead casements. QUARTERS, the main upright posts in framing, sometimes called studs ; the filling in quarters were formerly named prick posts. QUATREFOIL, any small panel or perforation in the form of a four- leaved flower. They are sometimes used cilone, sometimes in circles, and over the aisle windows, but more frequently they are in square panels. They are generally cusped, and the cusps are often feathered. (See CINQUEFOIL.) QUOINS, large squared stones at the angles of buildings, buttresses, &c., generally used to stop the rubble or rough stone work, and that the angles might be true and stronger. Saxon quoin stones are said to have been composed of one long and one short stone alternately. Early quoins are generally roughly axed ; in later times they had a draft tooled by the chisel round the outside edges, and later still were worked fine from the saw. RAG-STONE, a name given by some writers to work done with stones which are quarried in thin pieces, such as the Horsham sandstone, Yorkshire stone, the slate stones, &c. ; but this is more properly flag or slab work. By rag-stone, near London, is meant an excellent material from the neighbourhood of Maidstone. It is a very hard limestone of bluish-grey colour, and peculiarly suited for mediaeval work. It is often laid as uncoursed work, or random work, sometimes as random coursed work, and sometimes as regular ashlar. The first method, however, is the more picturesque. RANDOM WORK, a term used by the rag-stone masons for stones fitted together at random without any attempt at laying them in courses. Random Coursed Work is a like term applied to work- coursed in horizontal beds, but the stones are -of any height, and fitted to one another. REAR VAULT, a name sometimes applied to the inner hood-mould of a window or doorway, but no ancient authority for the use of such a term has been cited. REFECTORY, the hall of a monastery, convent, &c., where the religious took their chief meals together. It much resembled the great halls of mansions, castles, &c., except that there frequently was a sort of ambo, approached by steps, from which to read tho legenda sanctorum, &c., during meals. (See PULPIT.) REGULA (Lat.), a rule or square, the short fillet or rectangular block, under the trenia, on the architrave of the Doric entablature. REREDOS, DORSAL, or DOSSEL (Fr., retablc), the screen or other ornamental work at the back of an altar. In some large cathedrals, as Winchester, Durham, St Albans, &c., this is a mass of splendid tabernacle work, reaching nearly to the groining. In smaller churches there are sometimes ranges of arcades or panellings behind the altars ; but, in general, the walls at the back and sides of them were of plain masonry, and adorned with hangings or paraments. In large churches abroad, the high altar usually stands under a sort of canopy or ciborium, and the sacrarium 13