rinceau

architecture

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rinceau, in architecture, decorative border or strip, featuring stylized vines with leaves and often with fruit or flowers. It first appears as a decorative motif in Classical antiquity. Roman rinceaux most often consisted of an undulating double vine growing from a vase. Branches, vines, and thistles are mixed together in Gothic rinceaux, and in Renaissance examples tiny animals or human heads appear.

During the 17th century the rinceau returned to the simpler Classic style, and in the 18th century it was treated far more freely, with less rigid repetition of identical forms. In Classical Greco-Roman architecture the rinceau is generally found in a frieze, the middle element of an entablature, immediately beneath the cornice.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Kathleen Kuiper.