Terms, not to be confused with Herms…sometimes (architecture)

April 13, 2023
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Terminal Figure: Sphinx with crescent in her hair, Jean Mignon, 1540s. Description: This delightful term figure comes from a series of 20 plates featuring identifiable mythological figures as well as less specific flights of fancy. Though the lack of documented comparative material precludes precise dating, the relatively simple graphic means employed suggest that Mignon made them near the beginning of his career as an etcher, about 1543-44. Though early cataloguers categorized the prints in the term series as engravings by an anonymous artist, they are in fact etchings and fit rather well with other works attributed to Mignon. Precisely where they were made and who designed them remains unknown. The diadem in the hair of the sphinx strongly suggests that she is Diana, goddess of the hunt. Several other mythological figures are identifiable in the series, among them Hercules, Bacchus, and Diana of Ephesius. It is possible that the present etching alludes to Diane de Poitiers. A central figure at the French court, mentor and mistress to Henri II, who ascended to the throne in 1547, she was the subject of numerous works of art.

In Classical architecture and in art a term or terminal figure (plural: terms or termini) is a human head and bust that continues down as a square tapering pillar-like form. It is usually distinguished from a herm, which has a head and shoulders only, but the two words may be used rather loosely and interchangeably.

The god Terminus was 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 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. Ornament prints, such as a set of 20 School of Fontainebleau etchings from the 1540s usually given to Jean Mignon, disseminated the style through Germany and England. In these very fanciful Mannerist creations, many of the forms dip in and out of architectural and anatomical shapes.

Terminal figures (4, 6 and 9, to be strict) copied from French and Antwerp 16th-century Mannerist pattern books. 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, &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, &c. [1]

References

  1. Lucie-Smith, 213
  • Cyril M. Harris (1977). Illustrated Dictionary of Historic Architecture. Courier Dover Publications, ISBN 0486132110; p. 528
  • Lucie-Smith, Edward, The Thames & Hudson Dictionary of Art Terms, 2003 (2nd edn), Thames & Hudson, World of Art series, ISBN 0500203652

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Terms.

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