Note 181 — Chapter X

F. C. Penrose showed in 1851 that all the quasi-horizontal lines in the Parthenon are really arcs of circles, that the ‘entasis’ or swelling of every pillar is the true arc of an hyperbola, and that there is not a true right-angle nor a strictly vertical column in the building. All good Greek buildings are similarly full of “curves, leaning faces, irregular spacings, and other optical refinements” (Investig. of the Princs. of Athenian Architecture). This principle, called by Ruskin ‘life’ (Seven Lamps) and by some ‘symmetrophobia,’ was most daringly applied in mediæval building. A very striking and well illustrated series of articles on the subject was contributed by Mr. W. H. Goodyear to the Architectural Record, Vol. VI, 1896-7.