CORNICE (OF.. It. cornice. cornix, bor der, from Gk. Kapwric, korunis, garland, from KoptdrOc, koronos, curved; connected with Lat. scone, crown. lr. •o•. circle). In architecture, either the crowning member of a wall or a projection from it, such as a coping, or the crown of a minor division, as a colonnade. It has been used in nearly every style. The usual Egyptian cornice consists of a fillet and eavetto molding, as the upper member of a simple en tablatu•e crowning all the main walls. Ancient Oriental architecture did not develop any style of cornice. It was reserved for Greek architec ture to establish a type of cornice as the upper member of the entablature of the different orders. immediately above the frieze, as is more fully explained under ENTABLATURE (q.v.). The slant ing cornice of a gable is called raking cor nice, to distinguish it from the horizontal cor nice. The Doric cornice is crowned by a strong ly projecting corona, the upper part of which is the cymatium or cyma ; the lower part is usually the tenia. The corona rests on a thin bed-mold of one or two simple moldings. Along its horizontal edges are placed antefixes (q.v.). The under surface, or soffit, of the cornice is decorated with mutules (q.v.). In the more decorative Ionic em-nice there is no very pro jecting broad, that tenia. but a group of richer moldings gradually projecting. The corona is very high. the ogee cyma being richly decorated between two fillets, and connected with the tenia by a smaller regular eyma ; the lower part of the cornice consists of a flat denticulated pro jection immediately above the frieze. The Co-. rinthian cornice is both richer and more varied, its principal variation being the addition, in its central section, of mutules (q.v.)
and modillions (q.v.), and the adornment of the tenia with egg-and-dart and other ornamenta tion. It was not fully developed until Roman times, when it was also used in the Composite order, and the characteristic forms of the dif ferent Greek orders were nnngled. In early Christian and tiled hyval architecture the variety of forms of cornice is too great to allow of classification or description. Some resemldance to the classic cornice is preserved in the rich churches of the fifth and sixth centuries in Syria, and the classic type is even more closely followed in the medir•val churehes of sonic parts of Italy, especially !lame and its neighborhood; and it was, of corse, revived by the Renaissance. Medi:cval cornices are often supported on foliage and lines of small, blind arches: simple in the Romanesque, freer and richer in the Gothic style. The medieval surface decoration was usually in very high relief, often in part de tached from the ground. The imitation of every kind of foliage and flower, as well as the use of traditional and new geometric and schematic forms, gives great scope to this architectural member. In its simplest form it consists often of a projecting table supported on corbels, with or without arches.
The term is also used in modern terminology for the upper termination of a piece of furni ture, a window or door casing, or anything that acts as a frame, of whatever material it may he. Consult the works cited under COLUMN; ENTAB LATURE; which also discuss cornice.