acanthus

plural acanthuses · plural acanthi

1. A member of the genus Acanthus of herbaceous prickly plants with toothed leaves, (family Acanthaceae, order Lamiales (formerly Scrophulariales)) found in the south of Europe, Asia Minor, and India.First known use mid 16th century

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   The picture before which they paused represented one of those ruined fountains so common to Italy. Francesca gazed upon it as if it had been an old friend: many a time, beside such a one, with its curved and broken marble, had she wreathed the acanthus that hung around it, the green and trailing foliage so profuse in the South, into shapes even more fanciful than those which once suggested the Corinthian capital.

   1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], Francesca Carrara. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC

   Synonyms: bear's breech, bear's breeches, bear's-breech

2. architectureAn ornament resembling the foliage or leaves of Acanthus spinosus, used in the capitals of the Corinthian and composite orders.First known use mid 18th century

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   It is difficult to imagine that Bernard of Clairvaux was gullible enough to accept dozens of historiated windows, grisaille fields of griffins, mosaic pavements, carved acanthus capitals, inhabited vine columns, and golden altarware on the strength of the justifications offered by a single window, one tympanum, and Suger's libelli.

   1994 March, R Ousterhout, “Early Christian and Byzantine Architecture, an Annotated Bibliography and Historiography by W. Eugene Kleinbauer”, in Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, volume 53, number 1