Believe it or not we’ve made it through the entire alphabet. With 26 terms, and 38 words containing 92 syllables, we touched on 100 structures in 43 towns in 32 Mississippi counties. I skipped over having a AWOTW for the letter X since I couldn’t come up with any good words or examples for a WOTW. Any volunteers out there have a suggestion?
Map of Mississippi highlighting location of structures featured on MissPreservation.com’s Architectural Word of the Week in 2012
- Abacus 01/13/2012
- Bracket 01/27/2012
- Corbel 02/10/2012
- Dentil 02/24/2012
- Entablature 03/09/2012
- Flemish Bond 03/23/2012
- Grounds 04/06/2012
- Hyperbolic Paraboloid Shell 04/20/2012
- Imbrex 05/04/2012
- Jerkinhead Gable 05/18/2012
- Kneeler 06/01/2012
- Lally Column 06/15/2012
- Mushroom Capitol 06/29/2012
- Nogging 07/13/2012
- Onion Dome 07/27/2012
- Pilaster 08/10/2012
- Quatrafoil 08/24/2012
- Return 09/07/2012
- Scagliola 09/21/2012
- Terrazzo 10/05/2012
- Undercut Gallery 10/26/2012
- Vermiculated and Vomitory 11/02/2012
- Witch Door 11/16/2012
- Y-Tracery 11/30/2012
- ZigZag Molding 12/14/2012
If you leaned some new words (I did) this year or saw a building in a new light (I did) pat yourself on the back. If you already knew all the words I’ll supply you with a form to fill out so you can get your MissPres AWOTW epaulets.
My goal for the 2012 AWOTW was to highlight the words through Mississippi examples. One featured building that was not in Mississippi slipped though. Anyone care to remember what building it was and where it is located? Extra points if you can name the architect.
In the next year of Word of the Week I hope to get into some of the communities that we did not cover in 2012 and also diversify from architectural terms to include some preservation terms as well. If you have any ideas or something you like to know more about in the next year let me know. A kneeler might be made of stone but the future for Word Of the Week is not.
Have a happy and healthy 2013 y’all.
Categories: Cool Old Places, Historic Preservation
Preservation in Mississippi 
I have enjoyed AWOTW so much. I really enjoyed getting to see some of our very beautiful buildings with great features and accents that I did not know about and I had some “Oh Wow!” moments learning about features that I had not noticed on buildings that I thought I knew well. Thank you for the time you put in to making this fun and interesting.
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GStone, I am glad you have enjoyed the series so much. You are welcome as always! I certainly had some “Oh wow!” moments myself. Often times when I decided upon a word that I thought I knew of some examples I found frequently that those structures did not have the element I thought they did. It’s always fun (but also a good academic idea) to look at buildings from another angle. It really can put the structure in a new light and change our perspective.
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How about X-motif, as in the design on the doors, or the X-motif railing?
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Those are both good ideas. Do you have a definition and examples to share?
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According to Susan M. Enzweiler, MDAH 1987, in the nomination form for historic register of the Aberdeen City Hall, the original panels of the front doors bear an X-motif.
http://suzassippi.blogspot.com/2012/12/on-road-to-aberdeen-city-hall.html
Another example: xystus. James Stevens Curl, 2000, A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture refers to xystus as a Roman garden wall in front of a portico, with borders of trees, or a Greek covered portico walkway for exercise.
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Aberdeen has such a great city hall. I would think those doors would qualify as witch doors. I bet there are some porch railings lurking about that have an x-motif.
I’m sure there are Mississippi examples of xystus but I cannot think of one off the top of my head. Do you have any ideas?
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If you just go with it as a covered portico (although apparently, it was supposed to be attached to a gymnasium) then the one at the old Bobo Senior High School. If you go with the Roman definition, in front of a portico, and lined with trees, what about the walkway in front of Rowan Oak’s portico? Just speculating, of course, since this is way out of my field. :) Enzweiler said only the bottom panels were original, and that the top panel had been replaced with glass.
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Featured building located outside of Mississippi: Union Station, St. Louis, Theodore Link, archt. On the Scagliola post. Where do I pick up my points? And something I’ve always wondered, where can we use these points given away on MissPres???
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I will be happy to redeem them over at Lottabusha County Chronicles for a free subscription.
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The prize for ansering the question is that you get to write a guest WOTW post ;) jk
I mean unless you really want to then you can :)
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Curses, foiled again! Teach me to be a know it all!
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