‹‹‹ Vitr. 3.5.13 | Table of Contents | Vitr. 3.5.15 ›››
14The number of flutes in a column is twenty-four. They are to be hollowed, so that a square kept passing round their surface, and at the same time kept close against the arrises of the fillets, will touch some point in their circumference and the arrises themselves throughout its motion. The additional thickness of the flutes and fillets in the middle of the column, arising from the entasis or swelling, will be proportional to the swelling.
14Each column should have twenty-four flutes, channelled out in such a way that if a carpenter’s square be placed in the hollow of a flute and turned, the arm will touch the corners of the fillets on the right and left, and the tip of the square may keep touching some point in the concave surface as it moves through it. The breadth of the flutes is to be equivalent to the enlargement in the middle of a column, which will be found in the figure.