Rudiments of ancient architecture, containing an historical account of the five orders, with their proportions, and examples of each from antiques also, extracts from Vitruvius, Pliny, &c. relative to the buildings of the ancients (London, 1810 (4. Aufl.))

ANCIENT ARCHITECTURE. 27

projecture of the rafters, wherefore, in
stone or marble structures, the mutules
were represented declining, in imitation of
the rafters ; and also on account of the
droppings from the eaves, it is proper they
should have such declination."

This also explains the ornament and si-
tuation of the guttse, or drops, which were
perhaps large heads of nails, intended to
prevent the joist from drawing in too much
"by the incumbent weight.

The ornaments on the metope, or the
space between the triglyphs,may have been
originally trophies of the Deity, or imple-
ments of sacrifice placed there; as the
bull's skull, which has been deemed ap-
propriate to this order by the moderns.

M. Winkelmann has taken some pains to
prove, from a passage in Euripedes, that
the metopes or spaces between the triglyphs
were open in the most ancient temples.
How this may have been in wooden build-
ings, cannot now be determined: those
structures which remain, have the space
filled with masonry.

The profile here given is from the
theatre of Marcellus, which has ever been