page_title: Term (architecture)
hierarchical_section_title: Term (architecture)
caption_attribution_description: The Terminus (Plate 139.) The Terminus is a pilaster-like support, the fundamental form of which is characterized by tapering downwards in a manner recalling an inverted Obelisk. The name is derived from the fact that similar constructions were used in the Antique as milestones and to mark the Terminations of fields, &amp;c. The Terminus consists of the profiled base, not infrequently supported on a special pedestal (figs. 3 and 7); the shaft tapering downwards and usually ornamented with festoons (figs. 3, 4, 5, 10); and the capital, which is often replaced by a bust or half-figure (figs. 4, 5, 9). In this latter case, it assumes the appearence of a caryatid; and, as the bust is that of Hermes (the God of letters), this application is often termed a "Hermes". Standing isolated, it serves as a Pedestal for busts and lamps, as a Post for railings, and in gardens and terraces. The last was exceedingly popular in the Rococo period. Joined to the wall, the Terminus often takes the place of the pilaster. This is especially true of the furniture and small architectural constructions of the Renascence period. It is also not uncommon on Utensils, e.g. tripods, handles of pokers, seals, &amp;c. [1]
context_page_description: In Classical architecture a term or terminal figure is a human head and bust that continues as a square tapering pillar-like form.
  The name derives from Terminus, the Roman god of boundaries and boundary markers. If the bust is of Hermes as protector of boundaries in ancient Greek culture, with male genitals interrupting the plain base at the appropriate height, it may be called a herma or herm. The crime of Alcibiades and his drinking-mates, for which Socrates eventually indirectly paid with his life, was the desecration of herm figures through Athens in the dead of night.
  At the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Lady of Ephesus, whom the Greeks identified with Artemis, was a many-breasted goddess encased in a tapering term, from which her feet protruded.
  In the architecture and the painted architectural decoration of the European Renaissance and the succeeding Classical styles, term figures are quite common. Often they represent minor deities associated with fields and vineyards and the edges of woodland, Pan and fauns and Bacchantes especially, and they may be draped with garlands of fruit and flowers.
context_section_description: In Classical architecture a term or terminal figure (plural: terms or termini) is a human head and bust that continues as a square  tapering pillar-like form.
  The name derives from Terminus, the Roman god of boundaries and boundary markers. If the bust is of Hermes as protector of boundaries in ancient Greek culture, with male genitals interrupting the plain base at the appropriate height, it may be called a herma or herm.  The crime of Alcibiades and his drinking-mates, for which Socrates eventually indirectly paid with his life, was the desecration of herm figures through Athens in the dead of night.
  At the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Lady of Ephesus, whom the Greeks identified with Artemis, was a many-breasted goddess encased in a tapering term, from which her feet protruded. (See illustration at Temple of Artemis).
  In the architecture and the painted architectural decoration of the European Renaissance and the succeeding Classical styles, term figures are quite common. Often they represent minor deities associated with fields and vineyards and the edges of woodland, Pan and fauns and Bacchantes especially, 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 called Antwerp Mannerism. Engravings disseminated the style through Germany and England.
  Term figures as table supports or employed as candlestands (French guéridon) were characteristic of the Late Baroque Louis XIV style in France, the Low Countries and England, revived in the neo-Palladian furniture designed by William Kent and employed again in the French Empire style of the early 19th century.
caption: Terminal figures copied from French and Antwerp 16th-century Mannerist pattern books.
exif: {}