ARCHITECTURE 473 SET-OFF, the horizontal line shown where a wall is reduced in thick ness, and consequently the part of the thicker portion appears projecting before the thinner. In plinths this is generally simply chamfered. In other parts of work the set-off is generally con cealed by a projecting string. "Where, as in parapets, the upper part projects before the lower, the break is generally hid by a corbel table. The portions of buttress caps which recede one behind another are also called sets-off. SLYERY (probably connected with the English word sever), any main compartment or division of a building. (See BAY.) The word has been supposed to be a corruption of Ciborium, as Gervase of Canterbury uses the word in this sense ; but he probably alludes to the vaulted form of the upper part of the groining of each severy. (See ClBOP.lUil.) SHAFT (Fr. colonnctte, Ital. colonnetto, Gcr. Schaft), in classical architecture that part of a column between the necking and the apophyge at top of the base. In later times the term is applied to slender columns either standing alone or in connection with pillars, buttresses, jambs, vaulting, &e. SUED ROOF or LEAN-TO, a roof with only one set of rafters, fulling from a higher to a lower wall, like an aisle roof. SJIINGLE (Bled. Lat. scandula, scindula, Fr. bardeau, essente, Ital. scandola, Ger. Schindcl), a sort of wooden tile, generally of oak, used in places where timber is plentiful, for covering roofs, spires, &c. In England they are generally plain, but on the Continent the ends are sometimes rounded, pointed, or cut into ornamental form. SHIUNE (Med. Lat. fcrdorium, scrinium, Fr. cJidsse, ccrin, Ital. scrigno), a sort of ark or chest to hold relics. Sometimes they are merely small boxes, generally with raised tops like roofs ; sometimes actual models of churches ; sometimes large construc tions like that at St Albans, that of Edward the Confessor at Westminster, of St Genevieve at Paris, &e. Many are covered with jewels in the richest way; that of San Carlo Borromeo, at Milan, is of beaten silver. SILL or SOLE (Lat. sohim, a threshold, whence the Fr. seuil), the horizontal base of a door or window- frame. A technical distinc tion is made between the inner or wooden base of the window- frame and the stone base on which it rests, the latter being called the sill of the window, and the former that of its frame. This term is not restricted to the bases of apertures ; the lower horizontal part of a framed partition is called its sill. The term is sometimes incorrectly written cill. SLEEPER (Fr. dormant), a piece of timber laid on low cross walls as a plate to receive ground joists. SLYPE, a name for the covered passage usually found in monasteries between the end of the transept and the chapter-house. SOFFIT (Ital. soffilta, a ceiling), the inverted horizontal face of anything, as, for example, of an entablature resting on and lying open between the columns or the underface of an arch where its thickness is seen. SOLAR, SOLLER (Med. Lat. solarium, Fr. galetas, Ital. solaio), a room in some high situation, a loft or garret, also an elevated chamber in a church from which to watch the lamps burning before the altars. SOLE. See SILL. SUMMER (Fr. sommicr), a girder or main-beam of a floor; if supported on two story posts and open below, it is called a brace-summer. SOUND BOARD (Fr. abat-voix}, the covering of a pulpit to deflect the sound into a church. (See TESTER.) SPAN", the width or opening of an arch between the walls, &c., from which it springs, also the width of a roof between the plates. SPAN ROOF, a roof having two sides inclining to a centre or ridge, in contradistinction to JT SUED HOOF (which see). SPANDRIL or SPANDREL, the space between any arch or curved brace and the level label, beams, &c., over the same. The spandrils over door-ways in Perpendicular works are generally richly decor ated. At Magdalene College, Oxford, is one which is perforated, and has a most beautiful effect. The spandril of doors is some- limes ornamented in the Decorated period, but seldom forms part of the composition of the doorway itself, being generally over the label. SPIRE (Fr. aiguille, Jlechc, Ital. guglio, Ger. Spilzc), a sharply- pointed pyramid or large pinnacle, generally octagonal in England, and forming a finish to the tops of towers. In this country, in Norrnan times, the only attempt at anything like a spire consisted in the termination of some turrets, as those at Rochester, at St Peter s, Oxford, &e. ; but these are rather PINNACLES (which see) than spires. Later Norman spires arc supposed to have been merely low pyramidal roofs. In the Early English period they appear at first to have been low, as the remains of the one at Christ Church, Oxford, show; but afterwards they become much more lofty and simply pointed. The probability is that the sight of the high xiomes and- aspiring minarets of the Holy Land had suggested the erection of these lofty monuments to the Crusaders. At this jioriod the spires generally covered the whole tower top, and had Ilium-Jungs where the square broke into the octagon. In the Decorated period the spires became still slenderer and sharper; the broach spire gradually gave place to those rising at once in octagon form from the flat of the towers surrounded with parapets, often richly perforated, and with pinnacles at the angles. The spires themselves often are decorated with ball-flowers and crockets, and sometimes have broad horizontal bands of tracery at intervals. In both these styles spire lights or lucarnes are common. Perpendicular spires partake also of most of these cha racteristics, except that they scarcely furnish an example of a broach spire. It is remarkable with how little material some of the loftiest spires have been erected, that at Salisbury being barely 9 inches thick for a great part of its height. On the Continent the spire seems to have been used earlier than with us. That at Brantome is a mere low pyramid. At Saintes it is a low carved cone, with something of domical character. AtEoullet it is a sharp circular cone, with four open pinnacles at the base. At Isomes it is octagonal, and as sharp as many of our Early English spires. In all these examples the windows below are semicircular. Timber spires are very common in England. Some are covered with lead in flat sheets, others with the same metal in narrow stripes laid diagonally. Very many are covered with shingles. Abroad there are some elegant examples of spires of open timber work covered with lead. SPIRE-LIGHTS. See LUCAIINE. SPRINGER, the stone from which an arch springs,; in some cases this is a capital, or impost, in other cases the mouldings continue down the pier. The lowest stone of the gable is sometimes called a springer. SPUR, SPERVER. The word spur is often applied to the carved wooden brackets or hanses which support the penthouse of a door, the level part being called a sperver. SQUIXCHES, small arches or corbelled sets-off running diagonally, and, as it were, cutting off the corners of the interior of towers, to bring them from the square to the octagon, &c., to carry aspire. (See PENDENTIVE.) SQUINT, an oblique opening, often a mere narrow, square-headed slit, piercing the walls of the chancel arch, and evidently intended to afford a view of the high altar. quints are often without any ornament, but are sometimes arched and occasionally en riched with open tracery. Sometimes they look from the rooms over porches, sometimes from side chapels, but in every instance are so situated that the altar may be seen. The most probable use of them was to let the acolyte appointed to ring the sanctus bell see the performance of mass, and enable liiin to sound the bell at the proper time. STAGE, an elevated floor, particularly the various stories of a bell-tower, &c. The term is also applied to the plain parts of buttresses between cap and cap where they set back, or where they are divided by horizontal strings and panelling. It is used, too, by William of Worcester to describe the compartments of windows between transom and transom, in contradistinction to the word bay, which signifies a division between mulliou and mullion. (See STORY.) STALL, a fixed seat in the choir for the use of the clergy. In early Christian times the thronus, cathedra, or scat of the bishop, was in the centre of the apsis or bema behind the altar, and against the wall; those of the presbyters also were against the wall, branching off from side to side round the semicircle. In later times the stalls occupied both sides of the choir, return seats being placed at the ends for the prior, dean, precentor, chancellor, or other officers. The seats are very peculiar. (See MISERERE.) In general, in cathedrals, each stall is surmounted by taber nacle work, and rich canopies, generally of oak, of which those at Winchester, Henry VII. s Chapel, and Manchester, may be quoted as line instances. (See TABERNACLE, CANOPY.) The word ij sometimes used to express any chief seat, as in a dining hall. STANCHION, a word derived from the French etan^on, a wooden post, and applied to the upright iron bars which pass tl.fough the eyes of the saddle bars or horizontal irons to steady the lead lights. The French call the latter traverses, the stanchions montans, and the whole arrangement armature. Stanchions frequently finish with ornamental heads forged out of the iron. STAY BARS, saddle bars passing through the mullions in one length across the whole window, and secured to the jambs on each side. (See SADDLE BAR.) STEEPLE (Fr. docker, Ital. campanile, Ger. Gloekcnthurm], a general name for the whole arrangement of TOWER, BELFRY, SPIRE, &c. (See under those headings.) STELE (Gr. o-rfa-n, Lat. cippus, a small monument), the ornament on the. ridge of a Greek temple, answering to the antefixffi on the summit of the flank entablatures. STEREOBATE (Gr. a-repeJr, solid, and #<<m, a base), a basement, distinguished from the nearly equivalent term STYLOBATE, q. v., by the absence of columns. STILTED, anything raised above its usual level. STOA (Gr. a-rod, a portico), the Greek equivalent for the Latin PORTICUS, and the Italo-English PORTICO, q.v
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