Term (architecture)

Terminal Figure: Sphinx with crescent in her hair,Jean Mignon,1540s

Terminal figures (4, 6 and 9, to be strict) copied from French and Antwerp 16th-centuryManneristpattern books.

InClassical architectureand in art atermorterminal figure(pl.:termsortermini) is a human head and bust that continues down as a square tapering pillar-like form. It is usually distinguished from aherm,which has a head and shoulders only,but the two words may be used rather loosely and interchangeably.

The godTerminuswas the Etruscan and Roman deity of boundaries, and classical sources say that boundary markers often took the form of a half-figure of the god on a pillar, though ancient survivals in this form are extremely rare.

In the architecture and the painted architectural decoration of the EuropeanRenaissanceand the succeedingClassical styles,term figures are quite common. Often they represent minor deities associated with fields and vineyards and the edges of woodland,PanandfaunsandBacchantesespecially, and they may be draped with garlands of fruit and flowers.

Term figures were a particularly characteristic feature of the 16th-century style in furniture and carved interior decoration that is calledAntwerp Mannerism.Ornament prints,such as a set of 20School of Fontainebleauetchings from the 1540s usually given toJean Mignon,disseminated the style through Germany and England. In these very fancifulManneristcreations, many of the forms dip in and out of architectural and anatomical shapes.

References

• Cyril M. Harris (1977).Illustrated Dictionary of Historic Architecture.Courier Dover Publications,ISBN0486132110;p. 528
• Lucie-Smith, Edward,The Thames & Hudson Dictionary of Art Terms,2003 (2nd edn), Thames & Hudson, World of Art series,ISBN0500203652

External links

• "Terminal Figures".Encyclopædia Britannica.Vol. 26 (11th ed.). 1911. p. 642.
• Pair of terminal statuettes(The Metropolitan Museum)
• Terminus / Term / Terminal figure(Buffalo Architecture Index)