dentil Arch.
(ˈdɛntɪl)
Also 7 dentile.
[a. obs. F. dentille (16th c. in Littré); a fem. deriv. of dent; cf. Pr. dentilh masc.:—L. denticulus, dim. of dens, dent-em tooth. See also denticule, dentel.]
Each of the small rectangular blocks, resembling a row of teeth, under the bed-moulding of the cornice in the Ionic, Corinthian, Composite, and sometimes Doric, orders.
| 1663 Gerbier Counsel 71 The Dentiles at three pence per foot. 1783 Ainsworth Lat. Dict. (Morell) 1, Dentles [in architecture], dentuli. 1849 Freeman Archit. 113 The dentils introduced just under the cornice..are a great source of richness. 1865 C. T. Newton Trav. Levant xxviii. 307 A stone forming the angle of a small pediment, with dentils coarsely executed. |
† b. transf. That member of the entablature in which the dentils (when present) are cut. Obs.
| 1726 Leoni Alberti's Archit. II. 40 b, An upright cymatium; and over that a plain dentil. 1789 P. Smyth tr. Aldrich's Archit. (1818) 89 A reglet divided, its parts alternately omitted, is called a dentil. |
c. attrib.
| 1754 in Willis & Clark Cambridge (1886) I. 38 That..a Parapet Wall be erected, adorned with a Dentil Cornice. 1812–6 J. Smith Panorama Sc. & Art I. 180 Under the modillions is placed an ovolo, and then a fillet and the dentil face, which is often left uncut in exterior work. 1823 P. Nicholson Pract. Build. 474 The dentil-bands should remain uncut. 1865 J. G. Nichols in Herald & Geneal. July 254 The classical dentil moulding. |