FRET, properly, to devour, hence to gnaw, used of the slow corroding action of chemicals, water, etc., and thus, figuratively, to chafe or irritate. Possibly connected with this word, in the sense of rubbing, is the use of "fret" for a bar on the fingerboard of a banjo, guitar or similar instruments to mark the fingering. In decorative art and architecture, the word means any one of several types of running or repeated ornament consisting of lengths of straight lines or narrow bands, usually connected and at right angles to each other in T, L or square-cornered G shapes, so arranged that the spaces between the lines or bands are ap proximately equal to the width of the bands. Occasionally the system is arranged so that the lines intersect or interlace, as in the common "swastika (q.v.) fret." As the fret is one of the simplest and most natural decorative forms that can be produced in textiles, it is one of the most widely spread and is found alike from early times in all the continents. Thus it is a favourite decoration for the ceilings of Egyptian tombs from the fourth dynasty on, in later examples combined with rosettes, scarabs and the lotus into patterns of great richness. In America, it is found in early Peruvian textiles, it is frequent in sculpture and archi tecture in the Maya and Aztec remains in Central America and Mexico, and it is one of the most universal of pottery decorations among the plains Indians. It was highly developed by both Chinese and Japanese for textiles as well as for architectural orna ment ; it occurs not only as a band but as a complicated all-over pattern, sometimes with acute and obtuse angles instead of the more usual right angles. But its most important development was that by the Greeks (hence the common name "Greek fret"), who used it not only for pottery, but painted on architectural mem bers, such as the abaci of capitals, and later carved it. Like so many Greek motives it was widely used by the Romans particu larly in Syria (e.g., the propylaea at Damascus and the great tem ple at Baalbek) and occurs in Byzantine and Romanesque work.
"Fret-work" has a wider significance and is often used of any small scale repeated ornament in which geometrical forms occur especially if in low relief or pierced. (T. F. H.)