ovolo

[oh-vuh-loh]

noun

Architecture.

plural

ovoli 

1. a convex molding forming or approximating in section a quarter of a circle or ellipse.

ovolo

/ ˈəʊvəˌləʊ /

noun

1. Also called: quarter round.  thumb. architect a convex moulding having a cross section in the form of a quarter of a circle or ellipse Compare congé echinus

Word History and Origins

Origin of ovolo¹

1655–65; < Italian, variant (now obsolete) of uovolo, diminutive of uovo egg ¹ < Latin ōvum

Word History and Origins

Origin of ovolo¹

C17: from Italian: a little egg, from ovo egg, from Latin ōvum

Example Sentences

It has been quite a good year for the queen of local mushrooms, the russet-capped ovolo; and a pretty good one for the king, or “little pig”, the porcino.

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Apropos of Sherwood's at Jamestown, few of us, if any, know that his mansion possessed openings with ovolo bricks—bricks rubbed and cut in an egg-shaped ornamental moulding.

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Again: the Doric capital was unimitative; but all the beauty it had was dependent on the precision of its ovolo, a natural curve of the most frequent occurrence.

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The term is sometimes given to the ovolo of the Ionic capital, especially when curved with the egg-and-tongue enrichment.

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Lastly, the crowning part is, in the Greek Doric, a single convex moulding, not very dissimilar in profile to the ovolo of the capital, and forming what we commonly call an eaves-gutter.

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