Antefixa

“Antefixa representing Minerva superintending the construction of the Ship Argo. Antefixa are terra-cottas, which exhibited various ornamental designs, and were used in architecture to cover the frieze of the entablature. These terra-cottas do not appear to have been used among the Greeks, but were probabl Etruscan in their origin, and were thence taken for the decoration of Roman buildings. The name antefixa is evidently derived from the circumstance that they were fixed before the buildings which they adorned. Cato, the censor, complained that the Romans of his time began to despise ornaments of this description, and to prefer the marble friezes of Athens and Corinth. The rising taste which Cato deplored may account for the superior beauty of the antefixa preserved in the British Museum, which were discovered at Rome.” — Smith, 1873

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