The placing of the triglyphs directly on the corner, and the recess ing of the metope faces in order to have the triglyph face in plane with the architrave face, are two distinctive customs of Greek usage that are at variance with the later Roman examples of the Doric Order; although there is no parallel case, so far as the corner treatment is concerned, in real Roman work.
Cornice. Above these triglyphs and metopes, and breaking around them, runs a small band and a fillet, above which occurs the rest of the Doric entablature, composed of two parts, a bed-mould and corona, the principal one being the corona, serving, as we have already said, to throw the water that falls upon the roof to a certain distance from the foot of the edifice. This corona—which, because of its use, is the most essential member of the cornice—is a strongly projecting part, and is accompanied on its under side by a series of inclined mutules of the same width as the triglyphs. These mutules are placed directly over each triglyph, and have in turn guttæ—generally eighteen in number arranged in three rows of six guttæ each—depending from their soffits, the guttæbeing invariably round in plan and comparatively shallow in depth. Occasionally the space between these mutules and over the metope is left plain, or it is sometimes paneled, while in other cases another mutule is inserted directly over the center of the metope below. Occasionally, though more rarely, there are instances where
the guttæ and regula below the ta:nia are also placed beneath this interpolated mutule and below the plain space of the metope. In the example of the Order shown in Plate XXXVIII, these mutules are shown with eighteen guttæ, as may be seen in the small plan of the soffit drawn at the right of the column. The mutules themselves in Greek work are generally sloping. The plan of this cornice soffit also shows the treatment on the corner angle, where the square space left between the two mutules is carved, generally after the fashion shown in this example.
The corona is surmounted by a separating moulding that is found again across the pediment; while crowning all is the gutter, the face of which generally forms the cyma of the cornice; and this exterior face is oftentimes decorated with the heads of lions, from whose open mouths spouts the water escaping from the roof. The cyma is re peated on the sloping cornices of the pediment, but the lions' heads, having no utility, are here omitted.
The mouldings of the Doric Order are never given sculptured ornaments.