Bargeboard
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bargeboard (probably from Medieval Latin bargus, or barcus, a scaffold, and not from the now obsolete synonym vergeboard), the boards fastened to the projecting gables of a roof to give them strength and to mask or hide the horizontal timbers of the roof to which they were attached. Bargeboards are sometimes moulded only or carved, but as a rule the lower edges were cusped and had tracery in the spandrels besides being otherwise elaborated. The richest example in Britain is one at Ockwells in Berkshire (built 1446-1465), which is moulded and carved as if it were intended for internal work.
[edit] References
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.