[ad. L. volūta VOLUTA, or a. F. volute from the same source.]
1. Arch. A spiral scroll forming the chief ornament of the Ionic capital and employed also in those of the Corinthian and Composite orders.
1696. Phillips (ed. 5), Volute, a part of the Capital of the Ionick, Compound, and Corinthian Order.
1728. Chambers, Cycl., s.v., There are also eight angular Volutes in the Corinthian Capital.
1753. Phil. Trans., XLVIII. 34. On the top is an apex, with a volute on each side.
1789. Smyth, trans. Aldrich’s Archit. (1818), 96. The volutes of the capital were generally by the ancients made elliptic.
1823. P. Nicholson, Pract. Build., 377. To produce graceful effects in the foliage and contour of the volutes.
1841. W. Spalding, Italy & It. Isl., I. 174. Complete Doric fronts, with volutes and other decorations foreign to the order.
1879. Baring-Gould, Germany, II. 344. The English capital was circular; the volute disappeared at once.
2. A spiral conformation; a convolution, twist or turn; a thing or part having a spiral form.
1756. in Shenstone’s Wks. (1793), I. p. lxiii. The smooth volutes of Ammon’s horn.
1769. Falconer, Dict. Marine (1780), Cagouille, a sort of volute or ornament.
1794. Phil. Trans., LXXXV. 93. You may perceive by the drawing that they do not take such beautiful forms and volutes as a fine dry smoke usually does.
1851. Mayne Reid, Scalp Hunt., xxvii. 203. We carefully pare off the volutes and spikelets [of the cacti].
1885. E. J. Payne, in Grove, Dict. Mus., IV. 286. The carving of the volute, and the double grooving of its back, are among the most difficult branches of the violin-maker’s art.
1895. Hoffman, Begin. Writing, 129. Near the top of these are short volutes or commas, similar in type to the speech or voice commas.
attrib. 1875. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2714/2. Volute-compasses, a draftsman’s compasses in which the legs are gradually expanded, so as to trace a spiral.
3. The spiral shell of a gastropod of the genus Voluta; also, the animal itself.
1753. Chambers’ Cycl., Suppl., s.v., The Volute, variegated with two reticulated zones.
1775. Phil. Trans., LXV. 238. These anemonies had been found on old volutes, called spindle-shells.
1835. Kirby, Hab. & Inst. Anim., I. ix. 282. The cowries are said to have eyes exhibiting both iris and pupil, as have some volutes.
1847. Ansted, Anc. World, iii. 48. The numerous groups of flesh-eating gasteropoda (the murex, the cone, the volute, the cowry, and many others).
1874. J. G. Wood, Nat. Hist., 637. When young, the shell is very like that of a volute, having a prominent spire and a rather wide-spreading lip.
