3. Acanthe
The word acanthe, like plant names in general, is implicated in a complex onomasiological
network. The plant has a variety of denominations in French, Classical Latin and modern Latin,
all inadequately recorded by historical dictionaries, especially with regard to branche hircine. The importance of the plant during the Renaissance
is due to its serving as an architectural motif on Corinthian capitals. Martin's translation of Vitruvius' treatise contains illustrations of the motifs of the acanthus leaf and flower; the illustrator, Jean Goujon, comments on these figures in an appendix. Renaissance and
17th-century dictionaries are more concerned with the plant names than
with the use of the word acanthe en architecture. The User note
(WordCruncher terminology), linked to relevant items in the dictionary and text bases,
gathers together in synthetical form the findings of analyses of dictionary and textual data as well
of other electronic or print documents; subsequently this note serves as the basis for the writing
of an Expert note (ditto) intended for inclusion with the distributed
databases and giving linguistic, historical, bibliographical, etc., information, according to the
intended public. For the word acanthe, the Expert note deals both with referent and with
linguistic denominations.
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