Abstract
II. THE leaf in Dracunculus has a very peculiar shape: it A consists of a number of lobes which are disposed upon a stalk which is more or less forked (tends more or less to dichotomise). If you call to your minds some of the Pompeian wall decorations, you will perceive that similar forms occur there in all possible variations. Stems are regularly seen in decorations that run perpendicularly, surrounded by leaves of this description. Before this, these suggested the idea of a misunderstood (or very conventional) perspective representation of a circular flower. Now the form also occurs in this fashion, and thus negatives the idea of a perspective representation of a closed flower. It is out of this form in combination with the flower-form that the series of patterns was developed which we have become acquainted with in Roman art, especially in the ornament of Titus's Thermæ and in the Renaissance period in Raphael's work. [The lecturer here explained a series of illustrations of the ornaments referred to (Figs. 12, 13, 14).]
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On the Evolution of Forms of Ornament 1 . Nature 30, 272–274 (1884). https://doi.org/10.1038/030272a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/030272a0