Art History -Chap 7 - Vocab.

Aisle: Passage or open corridor of a church, hall, or other building that parallels the main space, usually on both sides.

Ambulatory: The passage around the apse in a basilican church.

Atrium: An unroofed interior courtyard or room in a Roman house.

Baptistry: A building used for Christian ritual of baptism.

Basilica
Plan: A plan consisting of nave and side aisles, often with transept and usually with apse.

Central-plan
building: Any structure designed with a primary central space.

Cherubim: The second highest order of angels, small naked child.

Crypt: The vaulted underground space beneath the floor of the church.

Good
Shepherd: A man carrying a sheep or calf or with a sheep or calf at his side.

Impost: A block, serving to concentrate the weight above, imposed between the capital of a column and the lowest block of an arch above.

Latin-Cross
Plan: A crossed-shaped building plan, incorporating a long nave and shorter transept arms.

Lunette: A semicircular shape; on a wall, often framed by an arch over a door or window.

Manuscript: A handwritten book or document.

Narthex: The vestibule or entrance porch of a church.

Nave: The central aisle of a basilica, two or three stories high and flanked by aisles

Orant: A standing figure praying with outstretched arms and upraised hands.

Parchment: A writing surface made from treated skins of animals and used during antiquity and the middle ages.

Portal: A grand enterance, door, or gate, usually to an important public building.

Rotunda: Any building constructed in a circular shape.

Spandrel: The area of wall adjoining the exterior curve of an arch between its springing and the keystone.

Syncretism: In religion or philosophy, the union of different ideas or principles.

Transept: The arm of a cruciform church, perpendicular to the nave.

Triforium: The element of the interior elevation of a church, found between the nave arcade or colonnade and the clerestory.

Vault: An arched masonry structure that spans an interior space.

Vellum: A fine animal skin prepared for writing and painting.

Menorahs: Seven-branched lamps

Loculi Long rectangular niches in the wall

Cubicula: Small rooms

Medal-lion: round ornament

Attributes: Identifying accessories

House-Synagouge: Jewish place of worship located in the home

House-church: Christian place of worship located in the home

Naos: Space containing the central dome

Nave
colonnade: Columns supporting an entableture lined nave

Apsidal: End of the nave and isles

Nave
arcade: Created by columns supporting round arches

Ciborium: Pavilion-like sturcture supported on four columns

Putti: Naked male child angels

Cruciform: Cross-shaped

Blind
Arcade: Series of decorative arches applied to a solid wall

Cenotaphs: Memorial tombs

Codex: Type of book

Miniatures: Illustrations in books

Illuminated: Manuscripts decorated with red and gold

Abstract: Any art that does not represent observable aspects of nature or transforms visable forms into a pattern resembling the original model.

Buttress: A type of architectural support. Usually consists of massive masonry with wide base built against an exterior wall to brace the wall and strengthen the vaults.

Cloisonne: An enamel technique in which metal strips are affixed to the surface to form the design.

Crossing: The part of a cross-shaped church where the nave and transept meet.

Diptych: Two panels of equal size (usaully decorated with paintings or reliefs) hinged together.

Gallery: A place where art is exhibited, specifically an art gallery.

Hieratic: In painting and sculpture, a formalized style for representing rulers or sacred or priestly figures.

Icon: An image in any material representing a sacred figure or event.

Iconoclasm: The banning or destruction of images, especially icons and religous art.

Mandorla: Light encircling, or emanating from, the entire figure of a sacred person.

Naos: The princiapal room in a temple or church.

Oculus: In architecture, a circular opening.

Pendentive: The concave triangular section of a wall that forms the transition between a square or polygonal space and the circular base of a dome.

Picture
plan: The theoretical spatial plane corresponding with the actual surface of a painting.

Pier: A masonry support made up of many stones, or rubble and concrete.

Scriptorium: A room in a monastery for writing or copying manuscrips

Squinch: An arch or lintel build across the upper corners of a space, allowing a circular or polygonal dome to be more securely set above the walls.

Trompe l' oeil: A manner of representation in which the appearance of natural space and objects is re-created with the express intention of fooling the eye of the viewer.

Iconoclasm: Image breaking

Muqarnas: Stalacite form of multiple squinches

Exedrae:

Reverse
perspective:

Vignettes: Lively smaller scenes

Quincunx: nine-bay, cross in square

Shater: Stepply pitched, tentlike rook form designed to keep dangerously large accumulations of snow from forming