Frieze

For other uses, see Frieze (disambiguation).

Doric frieze at the Temple of Hephaestus, Athens (449-415 BCE).

The Circus (Bath), UK. Architectural detail of the frieze showing the alternating triglyphs and metope. (John Wood, the Elder, architect)

Frieze of animals, mythological episodes at the base of Hoysaleswara temple, India

In architecture the frieze /ˈfriːz/ is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Even when neither columns nor pilasters are expressed, on an astylar wall it lies upon the architrave ('main beam') and is capped by the moldings of the cornice. A frieze can be found on many Greek and Roman buildings, the Parthenon Frieze being the most famous, and perhaps the most elaborate.

In interiors, the frieze of a room is the section of wall above the picture rail and under the crown moldings or cornice. By extension, a frieze is a long stretch of painted, sculpted or even calligraphic decoration in such a position, normally above eye-level. Frieze decorations may depict scenes in a sequence of discrete panels. The material of which the frieze is made of may be plasterwork, carved wood or other decorative medium.

In an example of an architectural frieze on the façade of a building, the octagonal Tower of the Winds in the Roman agora at Athens bears relief sculptures of the eight winds on its frieze.

A pulvinated frieze (or pulvino) is convex in section. Such friezes were features of 17th-century Northern Mannerism, especially in subsidiary friezes, and much employed in interior architecture and in furniture.

The concept of a frieze has been generalized in the mathematical construction of frieze patterns.

Achaemenid friezes

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  Achaemenid frieze designs at Persepolis.

Greek friezes

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  Ionic frieze at the Erechtheum, Athens, (421-406 BCE).

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  Top: Kyanos frieze from Tiryns. Bottom: Frieze of the Erechtheion in Athens, 4th c. BCE.

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  Frieze from Delphi incorporating lotuses with multiple calyxes.

Indian friezes

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  Frieze of the lost capital of the Allahabad pillar, with two lotuses framing a "flame palmette" surrounded by small rosette flowers, 3rd c. BCE

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  Rampurva bull capital, detail of the abacus, with two "flame palmettes" framing a lotus surrounded by small rosette flowers, 3rd c. BCE

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  Frieze of the Sankissa elephant, 3rd c. BCE

External links

• Media related to Friezes at Wikimedia Commons
•  "Frieze". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.