Architectural cornice fragment (mutule)

c. 1773

Measurements

4-1/4 in x 15-7/8 in x 7-7/8 in

Materials

Tulip poplar (guttae), hard pine (sides), and white cedar (block)

Credit Line

Historic Odessa Foundation, bequest of H. Rodney Sharp

Accession Number

1968.821

Inscription

"WILLIAM CORBIT MANSION 1771" is engraved onto a brass plaque attached to the fragment.

Provenance

Ex coll. H. Rodney Sharp.  Sharp must have acquired this fragment at the time he purchased the William Corbit house from the family.

Comments

This architectural fragment is a highly specific decorative element of Georgian architecture.  Called a mutule, it is part of the vocabulary of the Doric order.  Imitating a stone block, it formed part of the cornice.  A mutule was placed over each triglyph, a decorative composition of three upright elements that were spaced equally across a facia.  The underside of the mutule displayed two or three rows of short cylinders, call guttae.  This mutule, made of several smaller pieces of wood, is painted a sand-encrusted tan color, probably intended to represent stone.

Mutules of different sizes occur on the Corbit house.  Early accession records state that this particular fragment came from a cornice section removed from the roofline in 1880 when a bay window was installed facing Main Street.