Post and lintel
Post and lintel (also called prop and lintel, a trabeated system, or a trilithic system) is a building system where strong horizontal elements are held up by strong vertical elements with large spaces between them. This is usually used to hold up a roof, creating a largely open space beneath, for whatever use the building is designed. The horizontal elements are called by a variety of names including lintel, header, architrave or beam, and the supporting vertical elements may be called columns, pillars, or posts. The use of wider elements at the top of the post, called capitals, to help spread the load, is common to many architectural traditions.
Lintels
In architecture, a post-and-lintel or trabeated system refers to the use of horizontal stone beams or
Post-and-lintel construction is one of four ancient structural methods of building, the others being the
A noteworthy example of a trabeated system is in
History of lintel systems
The trabeated system is a fundamental principle of
Span limitations
There are two main forces acting upon the post and lintel system: weight carrying
The biggest disadvantage to lintel construction is the limited weight that can be held up, and the resulting small distances required between the posts.
As with the Roman temple portico front and its descendants in later classical architecture, trabeated features were often retained in parts of buildings as an aesthetic choice. The classical orders of Greek origin were in particular retained in buildings designed to impress, even though they usually had little or no structural role.[6]
Lintel reinforcement
The flexural strength of a stone lintel can be dramatically increased with the use of Post-tensioned stone.
See also
- Architrave – structural lintel or beam resting on columns-pillars
- Atalburu – Basque decorative lintel
- Dolmen – Neolithic megalithic tombs with structural stone lintels
- Dougong – traditional Chinese structural element
- I-beam – steel lintels and beams
- Marriage stone – decorative lintel
- Opus caementicium
- Structural design
- Timber framing – post and beam systems
- Stonehenge
Notes
- ^ L. Sprague De Camp, Ancient Engineers: Technology & Invention from the Earliest Times to the Renaissance (U.S.A.: Barnes and Noble, 1993 edition), 35.
- ^ C. Michael Hogan, Volubilis, Megalithic Portal, ed. A. Burnham (2007)
- ^ Post and lintel is the main structural system in Northern China, the southern traditional timber buildings which use a column-and-tie structural system. "Structural Mechanism Of Southern Chinese Traditional Timber Frame Buildings" SCIENCE CHINA Technological Sciences.2011, Vol 54(7) http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1112427956/structural-mechanism-of-southern-chinese-traditional-timber-frame-buildings/
- ^ Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 27 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 115.
- ^ Summerson, 13-14
- ^ Summerson, 19-21
References
- ISBN 0500201773
- Lyttleton, Margaret (2003). "Trabeated construction". Grove Art Online. Oxford University Press. .