MATERIALS. (from the French, materiel.) in architec ture, the different. kinds of bodies, or substances, used in the construction of edifices, as wood, stone, brick, mortar, &c.
It is chiefly frmit the valuable work of Vitruvius, that we are furnished with information respecting the nature of the niaterials used by the Greeks and Hotinins, and of the pirt.; cubit. modes in n hiell they were disposed in their buildings. From the accounts published by modern travellers and seicn tifie artists. we are also fu•dshed with further information respecting the practice of these people.
The materials chiefly made use of by them were timber, marble, stone. bricks, lime, and metals.
With regard to timber, the proper time for felling was reckoned from the beginning of autumn to the latter end of February, w hen the moon was in the wane. They considered wood, when quite green, or too much dried, as equally unfit for working. For joists, and windows, they required that it should have been cut three years, and kept for a con siderable time covered with cow-dung.
The Greeks most usually made use of white marbles as Pentelic, Parian, and that of .:a.os. The latter was very transparent.
The Romans employed many sorts, of various colours, and procured from different countries under their sway in Asia, Africa, and Europe.
The ancients frequently included, tinder the term marble, all hard stones which would receive a smooth fhie polish; the moderns confine the name to such calcareous stones as are capable of receiving a tine polish.
Alabaster resembles marble in taking a smooth fine polish, but is much softer and more easily worked. Gypseous ala baster, when polished, is slippery to the touch; and frequently contains so much carbonate of lime as to cause it to effervesce with acids; it was procured from Upper Egg pt between the Nile and Red Sea, also from Syria and Caramania. The cal careous alabaster is white, yellow, red, and bluish gray ; the fracture is striated or fibrous, in hardness inferior to warble ; it is known under the denomination of common and oriental; Italy and Spain produce the best.
The stone which was employed appears to have differed very materially in its qualities; some, becoming considerably harder on being exposed to the air, was worked immediately on being taken from the quarry ; but there was some of a softer kind, which, previous to being used. required to have
its quality proved by two years' exposure to the effects of the atmosphere.
Of tiles, they had, I. The unburnt kind, which were dried five years in the sun ; and, `2. Those baked by lire, after hav ing been made two years.
In the manufacture of these, they preferred a white chalky earth, dug in the autumn, exposed during the winter, and made into tiles and bricks in the sprii,g. The Greeks pro portioned the size of their bricks to the nature of the edifice : the largest for public buildings, were five spans each way ; those of the middle class were four spans; and the smallest called by Vitruvius, diodori, or by Pliny, lgdii, were two spans long and a foot broad ; the last were fbr private houses.
It appears that the bricks dried in the sun were mixed with chopped straw. Dr. Poeo•ke describes one of the pyra. mils construeted of brick : he measured some thirteen inches and a half long,. six inches and a half broad, and four inches thick : others were fifteen inches long. seven inches broad, and four inches and three-quarters thick. At Rome they were found by De of three sizes; the least were seven inches and a half square. and one inch and a half thick ; the middle-sized were sixteen inches and a half square, and eighteen to twenty lines in thickness; and the largest were twenty-two inches square, and twenty-one to twenty two lines in thickness.
Three kinds of sand are mentioned, that is, pit, river, and sea sand ; of these, pit sand was reckoned the best ; the whtte as prefinTed to the black or red coloured, and the carbuncle to all ; of the river sand, that was considered best which was found near torrents; the least value was put upon sea sand, and it was required to he well washed, to dissolve the saline matter, before it was used in plastering or rough casting walls.