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The classical orders are ancient styles of building design distinguished by their proportions and their characteristic profiles and details, but most quickly recognizable by the type of column and capital employed. Each style also has its proper entablature, consisting of architrave, frieze and cornice. From the 16th century onwards, theorists recognized five orders. Ranged in the engraving (illustration, right), from the stockiest and most primitive to the richest and most slender, they are: Tuscan (Roman) and Doric (Greek); Ionic (Greek version) and Ionic (Roman version); Corinthian (Greek and Roman) and Composite (Roman).
The order of a classical building is like the mode or key of classical music. It is established by certain modules like the intervals of music, and it raises certain expectations in an audiences attuned to its language. The orders are like the grammar or rhetoric of a written composition.
A column is divided into a shaft, its base and its capital. In classical buildings the horizontal structure that is supported on the columns like a beam is called an entablature. The entablature is commonly divided into the architrave, the frieze and the cornice. To distinguish between the different Classical orders, the capital is used as the most distinct characteristics.
A complete column and entablature consist of a number of distinct parts. The stylobate is the flat pavement on which the columns are placed. Standing upon the stylobate is the plinth, a square block – sometimes circular – which forms the lowest part of the base. Further up comes the remainder of the base: one or many circular moldings with profiles. Common examples are the convex torus and the concave scotia, separated by fillets or bands.
On top of the base, the shaft is placed. The shaft is cylindrical in shape and both long and narrow. It is placed vertically atop the base. The shaft sometimes decorated with vertical hollows of fluting. The shaft is wider at the bottom than at the top, because its entasis, beginning a third of the way up, imperceptibly makes the column slightly more slender at the top.
The capital rests on the shaft. Their is a load-bearing function of the capital, which concentrates the weight of the entablature, but it primarily serves an aesthetic purpose. The simplest form of the capital is the Doric, consisting of three parts. The necking is the continuation of the shaft, but is visually separated by one or many grooves. The echinus lies atop the necking. It is a circular block that bulges outwards towards the top. This is so in order to support the abacus, which is a square or shaped block that supports the entablature.
The entablature consists of three horizontal layers, all of which are visually separated from each other using moldings or bands. The three layers of the entablature have distinct names: the architrave comes at the bottom, the frieze is in the middle and the molded cornice lies on the top.
Columns are measured in a ratio. The ratio is the diameter of the shaft at its base compared to the height of the column. As a result, a column can be described as seven diameters high. Sometimes this is given as seven lower diameters high, in order to make sure which part of the shaft has been measured.
There are two distinct orders in ancient Greek architecture: Doric and Ionic. These two were adopted by the Romans, as was the Corinthian order. The Corinthian capital, however, was modified by the Romans. The adaption of the Greek orders took place in the 1st century BC. The three ancient Greek orders have since been used in Western architecture, both ancient and modern.
The origin of the Doric and the Ionic order is not different in time. Whilst the Doric order appeared on the shores of the Aegean Sea, the Doric order appeared on the Greek mainland. The Phoenician and Egyptian adapted the Ionic capital. Sometimes the Doric order is mistakingly considered as the earlier order.
Both the Doric and the Ionic order have existed before in wood. The temple of Hera in Olympia is the oldest well-preserved temple of Doric architecture. It was built just after 600 BC. The Doric order later spread across Greece and into Sicily where it was the chief order for monumental architecture for 800 years.
The Doric order originated on the mainland and western Greece. It is the simplest of the orders, characterized by short, faceted, heavy columns with plain, round capitals (tops) and no base. With only four to eight diameters in height, the columns are the most squat of all orders. The shaft of the Doric order is channeled with 20 flutes. The capital consists of a necking which is of a simple form. The echinus is convex and the abacus is square.
Above the capital is a square abacus connecting the capital to the entablature. The Entablature is divided into two horizontal registers, the lower part of which is either smooth or divided by horizontal lines. The upper half is distinctive for the Doric order. The frieze of the Doric entablature is divided into triglyph s and metopeIn classical architecture, a metope is the space between two triglyphs of a Doric frieze. Metopes were often decorated with carvings; the most famous example is the 92 metopes of the frieze of the Parthenon marbles depicting the battle between the Centaurs. A triglyph is a unit consisting of three vertical bands which are separated by grooves. Metopes are plain or carved reliefs.
The Greek forms of the Doric order come without an individual base. The instead are placed directly on the stylobate. Later forms, however, came with the conventional base consisting of a plinth and a torus. The Roman versions of the Doric order have smaller proportions. As a result the appear lighter than the Greek orders.
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