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ANALYSING ARCHITECTURE NOTEBOOKS

A rchitecture is such a rich and subtle field of human creativity that it

is impossible to encapsulate it completely in a single book. I tried to
describe some of the basics in an earlier book, Analysing Architecture,
which has now appeared in four editions, increasing in size each time.
But even though that book has almost doubled in content, there is more
to cover. So, rather than make the original even heavier, I have decided
to add further chapters as a series of separate smaller volumes.
These Analysing Architecture Notebooks are the new chapters
I would have added to Analysing Architecture had not excessive size
become a concern. The series format also allows me to explore topics
at greater length than if I were confined to just a few extra pages in
the original book. Nevertheless the shared aim remains the same: to
explore and expose the workings of architecture in ways that might help
those who face the challenges of doing it.

Simon Unwin is Emeritus Professor of Architecture at the University

of Dundee in Scotland. Although retired, he continues to teach at the
Welsh School of Architecture in Cardiff University, Wales, where he
taught for many years. His books are used in schools of architecture
around the world and have been translated into various languages.
Books by Simon Unwin
Analysing Architecture
An Architecture Notebook: Wall
Doorway
Exercises in Architecture – Learning to Think as an Architect
Twenty-Five Buildings Every Architect Should Understand
The Ten Most Influential Buildings in History: Architecture’s Archetypes

ebooks (available from the iBooks Store)

Skara Brae
The Entrance Notebook
Villa Le Lac
The Time Notebook

The Analysing Architecture Notebook Series

Metaphor
Curve
Children as Place-Makers

Simon Unwin’s website is at simonunwin.com

Some of Simon Unwin’s personal notebooks, used in researching and preparing this
and his other books, are available for free download from his website.
ANALYSING ARCHITECTURE NOTEBOOKS

M ETA PHOR
an exploration of the metaphorical
dimensions and potential of
architecture
First published 2019
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

© 2019 Simon Unwin

The right of Simon Unwin to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by
him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in
any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered

trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to
infringe.

Publisher's Note
This book has been prepared from camera-ready copy provided by the author.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Unwin, Simon, 1952- author.
Title: Metaphor : an exploration of the metaphorical dimensions and potential
of architecture / Simon Unwin.
Description: New York : Routledge, 2019. | Series: The analysing architecture
notebook series | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018035234| ISBN 9781138045439 (hb : alk. paper) | ISBN
9781138045484 (pb : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781315171906 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Architecture.
Classification: LCC NA2500 .U59 2019 | DDC 720--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018035234

ISBN: 978-1-138-04543-9 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-138-04548-4 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-17190-6 (ebk)

Typeset in Arial and Georgia

by Simon Unwin
for Jack
Metaphor is when the mind translates one thing into terms of another. It is a factor in
the generation of ideas, in architecture as in other disciplines.
 CONTENTS

PREFACE 1
INTRODUCTION 5
SIMILE, CLICHÉ, METAPHOR? 21
BODY METAPHORS 25
GENDER METAPHORS 37
TREE METAPHORS 43
DOORWAY METAPHORS 49
METAPHORS OF PERSONALITY 55
TEMPLE METAPHORS 63
COTTAGE METAPHORS 71
ARCHITECTURE-RELATED WORD METAPHORS 85
THE GENETIC METAPHOR 97
METAPHORS OF SENSE AND NONSENSE 107
MIND METAPHORS 117
LANDSCAPE METAPHORS 131
MACHINE METAPHORS 135
THE MUSIC METAPHOR 145
NARRATIVE METAPHORS 149
ENDNOTE 172
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 176
BIBLIOGRAPHY 177
INDEX 180
‘But the greatest thing by far is to have command of metaphor. This
alone cannot be imparted by another; it is the mark of genius.’
Aristotle, trans. Butcher – Poetics XXII (350 BCE), 1902.

‘The prophets used much by metaphors

To set forth truth; yea, who so considers Christ,
his apostles too, shall plainly see,
That truths to this day in such mantles be.’
John Bunyan – Preface to The Pilgrim’s Progress from this World to That which is to come:
Delivered under the Similitude of a DREAM, 1678.

‘Art is a lie that makes us realize truth, at least the truth that is given us
to understand. The artist must know the manner whereby to convince
others of the truthfulness of his lies.’ *
Picasso, trans. de Zayas – ‘Picasso Speaks’, in The Arts, 1923.

* Metaphor is one of the means used by artists (poets, critics, architects…) to try to
‘convince others of the truthfulness of (their) lies’.
 PREFACE

T his Notebook explores the role of metaphor in architecture. When

I began compiling it I asked various friends what their favourite
architectural metaphor might be. Many of them looked at me blankly as
if the idea of architecture having a metaphorical dimension was strange.
It did not take much conversation for them to realise, though it might
be a factor they acknowledged only subliminally, that metaphor is a
powerful element in architecture. The following pages will illustrate the
extent to which metaphor affects our perceptions of architecture, how it
is conceived, and how architectural metaphors have been borrowed by
other disciplines for their own theoretical explanations.
In the Italian/Spanish language film Il Postino (Michael
Radford, 1994), the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda (Philippe Noiret), tells
Mario Ruoppolo (Massimo Troisi) – the eponymous lovelorn postman
– that the essence of poetry is judicious deployment of metaphore
(metaphor in both languages). We might think of metaphor as a device
belonging to the poetry of words but metaphor can also be non-verbal
– visual, spatial, experiential… Metaphor is essential to the poetry of
architecture too.
Searchers after truth (scientists and logical philosophers)
are suspicious of metaphor. Comparisons on which metaphors depend
can easily be over-applied turning a useful device for explanation into
treacherous deception. Whereas a poet might be happy to describe a
man as a tiger, hoping to evoke ideas of primal wildness and a ruthless
lack of empathy with victims, a biologist or psychologist would reject
such an imprecise comparison. Even non-scientists would recognise
their own delusion if they concluded that the poet intended us to think
the man had yellow and black stripes and fangs like scimitars.

M E TA PHOR 1
 In architecture the situation is different from in truth-
seeking. Though there have been critics that have sought to transfer
into architectural discussion the distrust of metaphor felt by
logical philosophers and scientists*, metaphors in architecture are
generally thought of not as treacherous sources of delusion but as
(to use an architectural metaphor) cornerstones of creativity. Some
anthropologists think that too. Victor Turner, for example, in Dramas,
Fields and Metaphors (1967), wrote that ‘Metaphor is, in fact,
metamorphic, transformative’, and quoted Robert A. Nisbet – Social
Change and History… (1969):
‘Metaphor is our means of effecting instantaneous fusion of two
separated realms of experience into one illuminating, iconic,
encapsulating image.’
Both Turner and Nisbet were talking about the ways in which
we use metaphor to help portray an integrated sense of the world to
ourselves and to each other. Sense is different from truth, even though
we might sometimes think of them as being the same. Where ‘truth’
claims to be absolute, ‘sense’ recognises relativity – i.e. that each of us,
in various situations, makes, finds, yearns for or is given – by family,
friends, priests, politicians and their spin-doctors, philosophers,
journalists, scientists, polemicists, novelists, poets, playwrights,
commercial advertisers, bloggers, tweeters… – a sense of how things
are, which we might assert/accept, even fight for, as truth, but which
is nevertheless never more than a fiction the plausibility of which is
conditioned by our situation.
In a creative activity such as architecture, metaphor is less
a threat to objective truth and more (to use another architectural
metaphor) an arena of conceptual vitality – an arena being a performance
area shareable with others. Metaphors illuminate, leaven, stimulate…
in architecture as in poetry or any other creative field. We are told by
our teachers not to ‘mix metaphors’ but suggesting that metaphor itself
is a ‘cornerstone’, an ‘arena’ and a ‘field’, all on one page, illustrates

* notably:
Geoffrey Scott in The Architecture of Humanism (1914) where
Scott attempted to dismantle what he called ‘The Romantic
Fallacy’, ‘The Mechanical Fallacy’, ‘The Ethical Fallacy’, ‘The
Biological Fallacy’… all in favour of ‘Humanist Values’;
and
John Summerson in ‘The Mischievous Analogy’ (1941), reprinted
in Heavenly Mansions (1963), where Summerson questioned
Modern Architecture’s claims to be ‘organic’ and to express ‘the
spirit of the machine age’.

2 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
something of the problematic nature of metaphor whilst also hinting at
its creative possibilities.
Architects, as poets, should be aware of the power of metaphor.
One aspect of genius in an architect is (as Aristotle suggested for all; see
the frontispiece of this Notebook) a capacity for metaphor. We might
usefully ask of every (great) work of architecture, whether of the recent
or distant past, ‘On what metaphor is it built?’ For example, and as
is illustrated in the following pages, some were built on the idea that
buildings should be conceived as ‘machines’, others as ‘organisms’ like
living creatures – plants, animals, people… The possible variety of apt
metaphor in a creative activity is probably infinite. Novel metaphors
arise; originality can be linked to them. In this Notebook I have tried
to give a broad view of how metaphor has been used in architecture as a
stimulus to those who seek direction for their own design.
To its very origins, architecture is infused with metaphor.
The metaphors of architecture are protean ghosts haunting a many-
roomed labyrinth. They morph and fuse, subtly mutating perceptions;
like distorting glass. When you look more closely you realise that the
labyrinth of architectural ideology is ruled by those protean ghosts. In
relation to architecture, metaphor is not just a matter of what we might
call a recognition of intellectual correspondences; it infects all the senses
– emotionally and psychologically as well as physically. Any architect
who aspires to greatness must learn to exploit and propagate metaphor.
Some people may have looked quizzical when I have suggested that
architecture might be metaphorical but this Notebook will show how
deeply rooted this factor is and how powerful it can be.

Taking advantage of its ‘notebook’ format, this Notebook is a collection

of disparate examples. The general argument is that metaphors live at
the conceptual core of architecture; but those metaphors are of many
and varied kinds, which change and grow as you try to pin them down.
The best I can do is to present this account of my exploration not
discursively but by the gradual accretion of fragments of the general
tissue of metaphor – varied in character and potential – that may be
assembled by the reader into a creature of understanding peculiar to
themselves. No fragment of tissue is presented here in more than one
or two pages; but to help with the process of assembly I have sorted
them roughly into thematic sections. The aspiration is that your own
assembled creature will come to life in your architecture…

M E TA PHOR 3
The air of the language we breathe is infused with metaphor. We
identify, characterise, assimilate, make sense of things by metaphor.
Metaphor is ubiquitous. It has an extraordinarily powerful influence on
our perception and understanding of the world. We describe things to
others using metaphor, often subconsciously. Others describe things to
us using metaphor, and usually we understand what they mean without
undue thought. It is arguable that all religion and much philosophy is
based on metaphor. We explain things to ourselves using metaphor. Even
scientists, despite themselves, resort to metaphor to help them make
sense of the subject of their research; and technologists commonly use
metaphors to stimulate new inventions. Often it is metaphor that ‘takes
control’. Metaphors are, as we are ourselves (according to Prospero),
‘such stuff as dreams are made on’. And architecture is nothing if it is
not about conjuring up dreams.

Metaphors can be like

magic incantations.
They imbue things with
mysterious powers. If,
lying in bed, I casually
look up and notice that
the lamp hanging from
the ceiling resembles an
eye then, to some extent,
it becomes transformed
into an eye. Depending
on my mentality and any
paranoid proclivities I
might suffer from, that
lamp-eye could come to
haunt my life. This is no
insignificant power and
it is rooted in our sense Architecture uses the same effects, not just in the
of and fascination with images that may be applied to walls but also assisted by
metaphor, in architecture the subliminal power of light and axes. In the cathedral
just as much as in other above (Cèfalu on the island of Sicily) the gaze of Christ
aspects of life and Pantocrator, watching over His flock, is reinforced by the
creativity. architecture.

4 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
 INTRODUCTION

Architecture originates in our being in the world. Just by standing on the land
we identify a place and project our sense of the world outwards. Such places
constitute the beginning of architecture. By walking a line we generate a
pathway, straight or meandering, with a beginning and an end. Then we start to
change the world physically, to establish spatial structures to frame our being.
We develop our architecture through metaphor. In the distant past we looked to
those places we recognised and experienced in nature for ideas – the shelter
of a cave, the shade of a tree, the original refuge of the womb, our own proud
vertical stance and point of view, the communal circle we make with our friends
in a forest clearing… – and sought to emulate them in our architecture. We built
tombs as metaphorical wombs for the dead and homes as metaphorical wombs
for the living. We stood stones on end as sentinels and statues of our chiefs.
We made circles as manifestations of and containers for community.

M E TA PHOR 5
WOMB
metaphor as the seed of constructed architecture

The womb is one of the oldest and understandably most enduring metaphors
in architecture.

The womb is the original

refuge from the world,
from which we emerge
through a narrow
passageway.

Our relationship with

landscape is mediated by
our capacity for metaphor.
We think of a cave as a
womb within the body of
a hill.

We construct tombs as
wombs within mounds,
into which the remains of
the dead may be returned
to ‘mother earth’.
Maeshowe, Orkney (c. 2700 BCE)

Such tombs themselves

come to be seen as
metaphors for (the
ultimate refuge of)
death itself.
Tomb of Agamemnon (Treasury of Atreus), Mycenae (c. 1250 BCE)

6 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
‘The house (is) a substitute for the womb
– one’s first dwelling place, probably still
Sigmund Freud, trans.
longed for, where one was safe and felt so McLintock – Civilisation and
comfortable.’ its Discontents (1930), 2002.

Burial mounds lie in the

landscape pregnant with
their dead, their narrow
doorways portals leading
back to the dark realm
outside life.
Bryn Celli Ddu, Anglesey (c. 2000 BCE)

Houses are metaphorical

wombs too. Their rooms
are refuges from the
world, with hearths at their
hearts providing the spark
and warmth of life.
New Stone Age houses, Skara Brae, Orkney (c. 3000 BCE)

Religious buildings also

allude to the womb metaphor;
framing the presence of
gods and sanctuary for their
‘children’.

Pantheon, Rome, built by the Emperor Hadrian (c. 127 CE)

M E TA PHOR 7
MOUNTAIN AND CAVE
the Egyptian pyramid

The ancient Egyptian stone pyramid is a dramatic sculptural form in the

desert. But it is saturated with symbolic meaning based in metaphor too. It
is a geometrical mountain containing a small womb-like burial chamber. Its
grandeur is a metaphor for the (assumed) greatness of the Pharaoh interred
within. Its geometry is a metaphor for discipline and perfection, and its
alignment ties it into to the (perceived) order of the universe.

The power of the pyramid

is metaphorical. It derives
not only from its size but
also from: its content
– the Pharaoh’s burial
chamber at its heart; its
geometry – perfecting
natural irregularity and
aligning the tomb with the
four cardinal directions (as
well as some significant
stars); and its position – on
the threshold between the
life of the river Nile and
the realm of death in the
desert.
Pyramid of Khufu, Giza (c. 2500 BCE)

In our imaginations
ancient Egyptian pyramids
have become symbols of
death, of eternity and the
endless cycle of day and
night, of relationship with
the heavens and mystical
geometry… They are also
powerful memorials –
ever-present reminders
of people who lived
thousands of years ago.
In building them, Egyptian
architects accessed and
exploited some deep
stratum of our imagination.
The poetry of the
pyramid, which depends
on metaphor, resonates
through time.

8 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
PRESENCE
the standing stone

Metaphor is one of the mechanisms by which our imaginations assimilate

the world. We give sense to things through comparison. We theorise about
things we are trying to understand and describe by alluding to characteristics
they share with other things. We create new things by emulating the familiar.
The attraction of metaphor is not exclusive to our attempts to make sense of
the world through words. Thousands of years ago, architectural construction
originated in metaphor. Sometime in the distant past, we began consciously
constructing places as lasting metaphors for those ephemeral places we
make just by being in the world or adopt in our natural surroundings.

A standing stone is a metaphor for human presence. Not

only is there correspondence in their shared verticality. The
stone says of the people it stands for that they are here,
strong and dominate the surrounding territory.

The stone identifies a place.

It can establish a centre, act as a way-
marker, represent a dominant individual…

M E TA PHOR 9
COMMUNALITY AND RITUAL
the stone circle

We gravitate to clearings
in the forest to settle,
and to perform rites and
ceremonies. The clearing
provides a locus for
congregation, for coming
together as a community.
Entering the clearing we
become members of its
community, or intruders.

Standing in a circle we
demonstrate our cohesion
as a group. By forming a
circle we establish a place.
We are contributors to
discussion or spectators
at a performance. Those
who step inside the
circle become a focus of
attention, they become
performers.

We construct a circle of
stones (or tree trunks) as a
metaphor for the clearing
and the circle of people.
The circle is metaphor
as active architecture.
It identifies a place,
assimilating and emulating
places we adopt in nature
and those we make just by
being in the world.

As architects constructing metaphors in physical form we develop and

extend our intellectual and imaginative power over the world we inhabit. We
assert our potential as poets assimilating what we find, assigning it to our
own desires and creating new worlds within the one around us. By the subtle
processes of metaphor, correspondences become inventions.

10 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
DEATH-RELATED METAPHOR
Woodland Chapel, E.G. Asplund

Metaphorical correspondence may have operated

subliminally in prehistoric architects’ imaginations; i.e.
long ago we may not consciously have thought of a
cave as a womb or a stone circle as a circle of friends.
Such creative correspondence, as Freud and Jung
have indicated, can operate subconsciously. But, when
we become aware of the power of metaphor, we can
employ it with poetic purpose. I have analysed Asplund’s
Woodland Chapel in previous books*. Though small, it
is replete with apt death-related metaphor. In the sense
described by Pablo Neruda in Il Postino (see page 1)
Asplund’s chapel is an architectural poem.
On approach, the roof
The vertical axis mundi links the chapel with of the chapel appears to
heaven and eternity. be a pyramid – a form
associated with death and
memory.
The eight columns inside the chapel
are ancestors standing in the form The altar/lectern is in
of a stone circle. Raised on two a niche like a hearth
steps, they witness the ceremony as – a metaphor
reminders of the cycles of life. They for home.
support the chapel’s
internal dome – an architectural (Externally, a
metaphor for the sky. chimney appears
to rise from this
Walls are made to appear ‘hearth’ – another
thicker than they are metaphor for home.)
– a subliminally
perceived metaphor The catafalque – on
for security and which the coffin containing
mysterious the dead child rests during
separation from the service – is situated
the everyday. between the ‘hearth’ and
the axis mundi, suspended
between home and heaven.

The twelve columns of the porch

The horizontal axis
links the chapel with
the setting sun.
the funeral ceremony inside the chapel.
* see for example: Case Study 9, in
Analysing Architecture, fourth edition,
2014, pp. 289–91; and The Ten Most
Influential Buildings in History:
Architecture’s Archetypes, 2017, pp. 66–7.
are friends and relatives, amongst
which mourners mingle before
and after the service. The columns
are also the twelve disciples of Christ.
They mediate between the everyday
world outside and the sacred world of
The metaphorical correspondence of
columns to significant ancestors and
predecessors is old.
(See the quotation below.)

‘The midst of the edifice …was suddenly raised aloft Abbot Suger, trans. Panofsky
by twelve columns representing the number of the – On the Abbey Church of
Twelve Apostles.’ St.-Denis… (12thC), 1946.

M E TA PHOR 11
ARCHITECTURE AND COHESIVE SOCIETY
Abbot Suger and the Church of St.-Denis

Suger was abbot of St.-Denis in Paris in the

twelfth century CE. He left a written account of
the significant improvements to the abbey church
that he commissioned. Architectural historians
like to think of him as the client that prompted the
invention of ‘Gothic’ architecture (architecture with
pointed windows, and thereby distinguished from
the previous style, ‘Romanesque’). More relevant
to the present Notebook is his understanding of the
metaphorical power of architecture in relation to Rose window, St.-Denis
spiritual belief. Referring to his own commissions
he wrote:
‘Now therefore ye are no more strangers and The community is,
foreigners, says he, but fellow citizens with the metaphorically, the church;
saints and of the household of God; and are built the church (the actual
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, building) is metaphorically
Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone the community. This is a
which joins one wall to the other; in Whom all the mutual metaphor linking
building – whether spiritual or material – groweth people and architecture.
unto one holy temple in the Lord. In Whom we, too,
are taught to be builded together for an habitation
of God through the Holy Spirit by ourselves in a Abbot Suger, trans. Panofsky
– On the Abbey Church of St.-
spiritual way, the more loftily and fitly we strive to Denis and its Art Treasures
build in a material way.’ (12thC), 1946.
You do not need to be religious to appreciate Suger’s The Methodist Church
argument. He suggests that architecture, in the in Neath, South Wales
communal endeavour of its construction, promotes (opened in 1914) is
social and moral cohesion. Through building together called the Penny Brick
people are ‘builded together’ to become (for Suger) ‘an because the congregation
habitation of God’. This metaphor may be reversed: contributed a penny for
a built church is also a metaphor for a cohesive each brick. The building
community. Suger represents architecture as an act stands as a metaphor
of worship and infers that the aesthetic satisfaction for their cohesion as a
and pride experienced is evidence of God’s approval. religious community.
(Everyone feels satisfaction when a grand aspiration is
completed well.) The intricate and mutually supportive
cohesion of stone blocks in the structure of an abbey
church is presented as a metaphor for the intricate and * Suger was abbot at
mutually supportive cohesion of people in the (religious) St.-Denis when extensive
community that builds it. Each stone is an individual improvements were made to
shaped to fit the architecture of the whole, and the the church, giving birth to the
arrangement of intricate windows modifying light* from Gothic style of architecture.
His additions introduced more
the sky is a metaphor for revelation. In the above quoted
light into the interior, through
passage, Suger coins a mutual metaphor in which large stained glass windows.
the grand and ambitious church built of stone not only (See the quotation at the
frames its clergy and congregation but also reinforces bottom of the opposite page.)
the aspiration that its community might, in piety and This is not a difficult metaphor
cohesion, emulate its architecture. to appreciate. The Church
(institution and building)
interprets the Gospels – the
‘light of Heaven’.

12 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
‘Urbs beata… quæ ‘Blessed city… built
construitur in coelo vivis in heaven out of living
ex lapidibus…’ stone…’
‘Urbs Beata Jerusalem’,
seventh-century hymn.

A church is the physical embodiment of the efforts The south transept of

of people. It represents huge investment of human the Abbey Church of
resources: imagination, skill, living time, wealth… St.-Denis, built (as was
Its building is an act of worship, of commitment and the north transept) in the
devotion. Whether seen through the lens of religious century after Suger was
belief or not, such an achievement is an unquestionable abbot.
expression of the coherence and character of those
responsible. There is no dead weight in a Gothic church.
Every block of stone – members of the church – whether
in rose window, buttress, wall or column, plays its part Suger saw that this
in maintaining the church’s form, in defying gravity and metaphorical power did
keeping those tons of material in their proper place. The not reside only in the
whole is a powerful metaphor for the ‘building together’ finished building. The
(to use Suger’s words) of people – the human members effort involved in such an
– into a living and morally strong society. ambitious project (which
might take many life times)
‘Once the new rear part is joined to the part in front, brought people together
The church shines with its middle part brightened. in a communal endeavour
For bright is that which is brightly coupled with the too.
bright,
And bright is the noble edifice which is pervaded by
the new light; Abbot Suger, trans. Panofsky
Which stands enlarged in our time, – On the Abbey Church of St.-
I, who was Suger, being the leader while it was being Denis and its Art Treasures
accomplished.’ (12thC), 1946.

M E TA PHOR 13
GOD AS ARCHITECT
Mimar Sinan

‘Boundless thanks to that Architect of the

palace of nine vaults, who, without measure
or plumb line, without rule or compass, by His
hand of creation, made firm its arched canopy!
And endless thanks to that Master of the Sinan, trans. Crane and
Akin – ‘The Treatise
seven-storied workshop, who, with His hand Charmingly Named Record of
of power, kneaded the clay of Adam and in him Buildings’ (1588?), in Sinan’s
displayed His art and novelty.’ Autobiographies, 2006.

Towards the end of his long life, Mimar Sinan, architect of the grandest
Ottoman mosques of the sixteenth century, dictated his autobiography to
a poet (Sa’i). Through various false starts, Sinan tried to frame his life and
achievements in an appropriate form of words. He knew he had to recognise
his own insignificance in relation to God (he referred to himself as a ‘weak
ant’) and acknowledge the patronage of the various Sultans he had served,
but it is clear that his principal desire was to record (with pride) his own
achievements as an architect. It seems that finding an appropriate balance
of words was a more delicate challenge for Sinan than constructing a great
dome from stone. But he found a way with the help of metaphor.
Sinan’s mosques are themselves metaphors expressed
in architecture. Places of worship frame prayer and acts
of devotion. Architects conceive religious buildings as
containers of divinity – i.e. as metaphors, such as ‘the
house of God’, ‘the Celestial City’, ‘Paradise’… Sinan
saw his mosques as ‘Paradise-like’, as ‘houses of God’,
and as emulations of God’s own creation – the universe
itself.
Architects often turn to precedents to stimulate Hagia Sophia, with its
their imaginations. Sinan was impressed and influenced gigantic dome, was the
by Hagia Sophia in Istanbul (below) which became a inspiration for Sinan’s
thousand years old when he was in his forties. For over mosque designs. When he
nine hundred years it had been a Christian church but was working it was already
in 1453, a few decades before Sinan was born, it was a thousand years old.

Hagia Sophia

14 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
converted into a mosque. With its huge dome like the
sky supported on an intricate composition of columns,
arches and half domes, it presented the challenge Sinan
wanted to meet and to surpass.
The similarity in structural composition with
Hagia Sophia is evident in the Süleymaniye Mosque
(below; also in Istanbul), one of the grandest of the many
grand mosques Sinan designed. Of it he, with the help of
his poet scribe, wrote:
‘And the domes of that noble Friday mosque are
ornaments like bubbles of the sea of elegance,
and its highest dome is like the revolving heavens.
And its gold finial shining upon it is like the brilliant,
gleaming sun. And the minarets and dome are like
the Chosen Beloved, the canopy of Islam, and of
the Four Friends. And the ornamented windows,
which are without like or equal, resemble the wings Sinan, trans. Crane and Akin
of Gabriel. When they are illumined with the sun’s – ‘Record of Construction’
radiance, they are like an embellished rose garden of (1588?), in Sinan’s
the springtime.’ Autobiographies, 2006.
Sinan saw his own design as a respectful metaphor for
God’s creation expressed in architectural form, an apt
frame for worship.
It was in his fourth attempt at an autobiography
that Sinan referred to God as ‘Architect’ (opposite, top).
By the fifth and most complete version he had reverted
to referring to Him as ‘Creator of the foundation of the
seven stories… (and) Builder of the heavenly canopy of
nine vaults’. The possibility that architecture might aspire
to being a metaphor of the creation was kept, while
Sinan seems to have baulked at the suggestion that if
God is an Architect, then architects are, by reversing the
metaphor, gods. Sinan’s humanism (necessary to his
achievements) presented a quandary as to which agency
– God or the architect – deserved credit for bringing Like the Hagia Sophia
order and beauty to the world. (opposite), Sinan’s
Süleymaniye Mosque is
a metaphorical model of
the universe, expressed in
architecture.

Süleymaniye Mosque

M E TA PHOR 15
IMAGO MUNDI
building the world/universe, natural and social

‘The profound originality of architecture as

such resides perhaps in the internal mass. In
lending definite form to that absolutely empty Henri Focillon, trans. Beecher
space, architecture truly creates its own Hogand and Kubler – The Life
universe.’ of Forms in Art (1934), 2013.

Sinan believed that in the architecture of his

mosques he was emulating that of the universe
created by God. This metaphor is by no means
confined to his Ottoman culture. It is found in
widely disparate cultures.
In her anthropological investigation* of the architecture of * Suzanne Preston Blier –
the Batammaliba tribe in west Africa, Suzanne Preston The Anatomy of Architecture,
Blier noted that the name of the tribe could be translated 1987.
as ‘those who are real architects of the earth’. She
found their architecture saturated with metaphor. The
tribes use of language made it clear that they thought
of their houses as built images of the world: with the
lower inhabitable level – occupied by livestock – as
the ‘underworld’; the terrace level – open to the air and
where most everyday family tasks are performed – as
the ‘earth’; and the conical roofs of the granaries – with
their top access – as the realm of the sky.

sky
The Batammaliba people
think of their houses as earth
models of the world,
especially in terms of its
levels: underworld; earth; underworld
and sky.

See also page 26.

section facing east

sleeping kitchen

hearth
cattle hearth

entrance
female granary male granary

ground (underworld) level plan upper terrace (earth) level plan

16 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
A significant part of the power possessed by the
celebrated buildings illustrated below derives from
their metaphorical representation of the world/
universe, and our relationship with it and each
other, and with any gods we believe to exist.

The temple – the house of

the god – on its rocky crag
stands high above the city
and ordinary life around
(see pages 29, 32 and
94). The architecture and
its topography establish a
framework of relationship
between people and their
gods – a model of the
universe.
Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens (5thC BCE)

Architecture can model not only the structure of the

universe but represent social hierarchies on earth too.
Spatial structures become metaphors of conceptual
organisations. In both buildings below, levels relate to
social hierarchy.

heaven

nobility

common world (servants)

underworld
Villa Rotonda, Vicenza, Andrea Pallladio (16thC CE)

sky and sun

nobility

common world (servants)

underworld
Villa Savoye, Poissy, Le Corbusier (1931)

M E TA PHOR 17
ARCHITECT AS GOD
J.G. Ballard – High-Rise

The metaphorical reference to God as architect of the world/universe is

common, as is discussion of whether architects have a tendency to promote
themselves as secular gods. Sinan believed, and demonstrated in his
own work, that architects could claim substantial credit for the creation of
impressive, technologically astonishing and undeniably beautiful buildings
as ornaments to the world and metaphors for Creation. But maybe not all
architects have the ability to create work of such quality even though they
might think they have. Sometimes they are vilified as creators not of Paradise
but of dysfunctional, dystopian Hell.
In 1975 J.G. Ballard wrote a novel called High-Rise.
It imagined the disintegration of social life amongst
residents of an apartment block. Although the details
do not exactly match, Ballard’s high-rise was inspired
by those built by Le Corbusier and his followers in the
1950s and 60s.
Like Le Corbusier’s Unité d’habitation in
Marseilles (1952, below) Ballard’s apartment block aimed Like a cruise liner,
at providing everything needed for a community: shops, Le Corbusier’s Unité
educational and recreational facilities, including an d’habitation was conceived
extensive roof terrace. Le Corbusier’s metaphor was the as a self-contained human
cruise liner. Ballard takes the apartment block (and by ordained world, detached
implication the liner) as a self-contained world with the from the ground, with the
architect as creator – a metaphor for humanity at large. architect as its creator. As
In High-Rise, the architect – Anthony Royal – well as apartments, the
lives at the highest level of the world he has designed. building accommodates
But Royal is an ambiguous god. His building is conceived shopping outlets, a school
as an instrument of social order. But that order breaks and recreational facilities
down because of the unruly nature of the residents. His including an extensive
designing mind is not omnipotent. Eventually Royal is and sculptural roof
killed by Wilder, the block’s most savage resident. (‘God terrace – the realm of the
is dead… And we have killed him’, Nietzsche). (Olympian) gods.

Unité d’habitation, Marseilles

18 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
CONTENDING METAPHORS
an illustration of their inherent unreliability

‘Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As
people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.
They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them
thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. And
they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is
in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered
abroad over the face of the whole earth.” But the Lord came down to see
the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. And the Lord
said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and
this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will
be withheld from them. Come, let Us go down and there confuse their
language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” So the
Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth,
and they ceased building the city. Therefore its name is called Babel,
because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth; and from
there the Lord scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.’
Genesis 11:4–9.
The words ‘architect’ and ‘architecture’ are much
used metaphors: politicians are often referred to as
‘the architect’ of this or that policy; musicologists
study the ‘architecture’ of compositions; computer
systems have their ‘architectures’; and so on. But
what might thwart the idea that God is an architect
is the suspicion that the creation operates without
any underlying intellectual structure. (Though
some believe in ‘intelligent design’.) Also, any
architect’s explicit, tacit or unselfconscious claim
to be a ‘god’ is undermined by the way different
architects (professional or not) have different
visions about how the world they want to create
should be. They operate according to different
metaphors, and often find themselves working
in contrary or conflicting ways. (Some of those
metaphors are illustrated in the following pages.)
The Bible suggests that
‘In the center of Fedora… stands a metal the Tower of Babel was
building with a crystal globe in every room. not allowed to succeed
Looking into each globe, you see a blue city, because of God’s
the model of a different Fedora. These are jealousy. But maybe
the forms the city could have taken if, for one it failed because the
reason or another, it had not become what we architects could not agree.
see today. In every age someone, looking at They sought to promulgate
conflicting metaphors;
Fedora as it was, imagined a way of making they found themselves
it the ideal city, but while he constructed his ‘speaking different
miniature model, Fedora was already no longer languages’.
the same as before, and what had been until
yesterday a possible future became only a toy Italo Calvino, trans. Weaver –
in a glass globe.’ Invisible Cities (1972), 1974.

M E TA PHOR 19
ARCHITECTURE INHERENTLY METAPHORICAL
poetry and drama of mediation

Metaphors may be unreliable, especially when

stretched beyond plausibility. Their usefulness
might depend on certain shared characteristics.
But when the boundaries of these shared
characteristics are breached metaphors become
misleading and treacherous.
Nevertheless metaphors are a vital force
of creativity. Products of architecture mediate
between us and the world around and represent
our being in the world. Literally, the walls and roof
of your house mediate between you and your
surroundings, identifying (establishing, providing…)
a place (a refuge) that is more comfortable,
physically and psychologically, than being out in
the wind and rain or scorched by hot sun without
privacy and vulnerable to assault. Even those who
are without homes seek the limited and inadequate Here my children with a
(architectural) mediation provided by a cardboard friend are committing an
box, a park bench or the archway under a bridge. architectural act by sitting
In these representations, architecture is always under a tree. The actuality,
metaphorical. as may the image, can be
interpreted as a metaphor
Whether consciously and intentionally or subliminally for a harmonic relationship
and unselfconsciously, the architecture we human with nature.
beings produce may always be seen as a metaphor for See also page 45.
our relationship with that which is not us: that which we
tend to call ‘nature’ (even though we are ‘natural’ too);
that which we call ‘other people’, ‘society’, ‘our enemy’…
(though we are of course ‘other’ to ‘others’); that which
we call ‘chance’, ‘the supernatural’, ‘divine providence’…
(though we might act in ways that are unpredictable even
to ourselves).
If I settle under a tree – whether for shade or
psychological security – that architectural act (identifying
a place to settle) is a metaphor for a relationship
between me and the conditions in which I find myself.
We might describe it as a poetic manifestation of a
relaxed, innocent, mutual relationship with gentle
accommodating nature.
If I order my forces (if I had any) to build a
fortress to overawe and govern a subjected people then A fortress may be
that castle is a metaphor of a very different relationship: interpreted as a metaphor
a dramatic manifestation of an urge to dominate, to for a very different
control… and to protect myself from attack. relationship between
There are as many metaphorical subtleties in those responsible for it (its
architecture as there are in language, maybe more. The builders and inhabitants)
metaphorical power of architecture is inescapable and and their environment,
has many dimensions. topographical and cultural.

20 A N A LY S I NG A RC H I T E C T U R E NO T E B O OK S
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
core, F, becomes an electro-magnet, which draws A towards it. The
platinum tips are thus no longer in contact and the circuit is broken.
Immediately this occurs the iron core loses its magnetism and
ceases to attract A, which is then moved back again by the spring B,
so that the platinum tips touch, the circuit is once more completed,
and the process begins over again. All this takes place with the
utmost rapidity, and the speed at which the contact-breaker works is
so great as to produce a musical note. There are many other types
of contact-breakers, but in every case the purpose is the same,
namely, to make and break the primary circuit as rapidly as possible.
The efficiency of the coil is greatly increased by a condenser
which is inserted in the primary circuit. It consists of alternate layers
of tinfoil and paraffined paper, and its action is like that of a Leyden
jar. A switch is provided to turn the battery current on or off, and
there is also a reversing switch or commutator, by means of which
the direction of the current may be reversed. The whole arrangement
is mounted on a suitable wooden base, and its general appearance
is shown in Fig. 18.

By permission of] [Harry W. Cox, Ltd.

Fig. 18.—Typical Induction Coil.

By means of a large induction coil we can obtain a voltage

hundreds or even thousands of times greater than that of the original
battery current, but on account of the great resistance of a very long,
thin wire, the amperage is much smaller. The induction coil produces
a rapid succession of sparks, similar to those obtained from a
Wimshurst machine. A coil has been constructed capable of giving
sparks 42½ inches in length, and having a secondary coil with
340,000 turns of wire, the total length of the wire being 280 miles.
Induction coils are largely employed for scientific purposes, and they
are used in wireless telegraphy and in the production of X-rays.
The principle of the induction coil can be applied also to the
lowering of the voltage of a current. If we make the secondary coil
with less, instead of more turns of wire than the primary coil, the
induced current will be of lower voltage than the primary current, but
its amperage will be correspondingly higher. This fact is taken
advantage of in cases where it is desirable to transform a high
voltage current from the public mains down to a lower voltage
current of greater amperage.
 CHAPTER IX
THE DYNAMO AND THE ELECTRIC MOTOR

Most of my readers will have seen the small working models of

electric tramcars which can be bought at any electrical supply stores.
These usually require a current of about one ampere at three or four
volts. If we connect such a car to the battery recommended for it,
and keep it running continuously, we find that the battery soon
begins to show signs of exhaustion. Now if we imagine our little car
increased to the size of an electric street car, and further imagine,
say, a hundred such cars carrying heavy loads day after day from
morning to night, we shall realize that a battery of cells capable of
supplying the current necessary to run these cars would be so
colossal as to be utterly impracticable. We therefore must look
beyond the voltaic cell for a source of current for such a purpose,
and this source we find in a machine called the “dynamo,” from the
Greek word dynamis, meaning force.
Oersted’s discovery of the production of magnetism by electricity
naturally suggested the possibility of producing electricity from
magnetism. In the year 1831 one of the most brilliant of our British
scientists, Michael Faraday, discovered that a current of electricity
could be induced in a coil of wire either by moving the coil towards or
away from a magnet, or by moving a magnet towards or away from
the coil. This may be shown in a simple way by connecting the ends
of a coil of insulated wire to a galvanometer, and moving a bar
magnet in and out of the coil; when the galvanometer shows that a
current is induced in the coil on the insertion of the magnet, and
again on its withdrawal. We have seen that a magnet is surrounded
by a field of magnetic force, and Faraday found that the current was
induced when the lines of force were cut across.
 Utilizing this discovery Faraday constructed the first dynamo,
which consisted of a copper plate or disc rotated between the poles
of a powerful horse-shoe magnet, so as to cut the lines of force. The
current flowed either from the shaft to the rim, or vice versa,
according to the direction of rotation; and it was conducted away by
means of two wires with spring contacts, one pressing against the
shaft, and the other against the circumference of the disc. This
machine was miserably inefficient, but it was the very first dynamo,
and from it have been slowly evolved the mighty dynamos used to-
day in electric power stations throughout the world. There is a little
story told of Faraday which is worth repeating even if it is not true.
Speaking of his discovery that a magnet could be made to produce
an electric current, a lady once said to him, “This is all very
interesting, but what is the use of it?” “Madam,” replied Faraday,
“what is the use of a baby?” In Faraday’s “baby” dynamo, as in all
others, some kind of power must be used to produce the necessary
motion, so that all dynamos are really machines for converting
mechanical energy into electrical energy.
The copper disc in this first dynamo did not prove satisfactory,
and Faraday soon substituted for it rotating coils of wire. In 1832 a
dynamo was constructed in which a length of insulated wire was
wound upon two bobbins having soft iron cores, and a powerful
horse-shoe magnet was fixed to a rotating spindle in such a position
that its poles faced the cores of the bobbins. This machine gave a
fair current, but it was found that the magnet gradually lost its
magnetism on account of the vibration caused by its rotation. The
next step was to make the magnet a fixture, and to rotate the
bobbins of wire. This was a great improvement, and the power of
machines built on this principle was much increased by having a
number of rotating coils and several magnets. One such machine
had 64 separate coils rotating between the poles of 40 large
magnets. Finally, permanent magnets were superseded by electro-
magnets, which gave a much more powerful field of force.
 Fig. 19.—Diagram showing principle of Dynamo
producing Alternating Current.

Having seen something of the underlying principle and of the

history of the dynamo, we must turn our attention to its actual
working. Fig. 19 is a rough representation of a dynamo in its simplest
form. The two poles of the magnet are shown marked north and
south, and between them revolves the coil of wire A¹ A², mounted on
a spindle SS. This revolving coil is called the armature. To each of
the insulated rings RR is fixed one end of the coil, and BB are two
brushes of copper or carbon, one pressing on each ring. From these
brushes the current is led away into the main circuit, and in this case
we may suppose that the current is used to light a lamp.
In speaking of the induction coil we saw that the currents
induced on making and on breaking the circuit flowed in opposite
directions, and similarly, Faraday found that the currents induced in a
coil of wire on inserting and on withdrawing his magnet flowed in
opposite directions. In the present case the magnet is stationary and
the coil moves, but the effect is just the same. Now if we suppose
the armature to be revolving in a clockwise direction, then A¹ is
descending and entering the magnetic field in front of the north pole,
consequently a current is induced in the coil, and of course in the
main circuit also, in one direction. Continuing its course, A¹ passes
away from this portion of the magnetic field, and thus a current is
induced in the opposite direction. In this way we get a current which
reverses its direction every half-revolution, and such a current is
called an alternating current. If, as in our diagram, there are only two
magnetic poles, the current flows backwards and forwards once
every revolution, but by using a number of magnets, arranged so
that the coil passes in turn the poles of each, it can be made to flow
backwards and forwards several times. One complete flow
backwards and forwards is called a period, and the number of
periods per second is called the periodicity or frequency of the
current. A dynamo with one coil or set of coils gives what is called
“single-phase” current, that is, a current having one wave which
keeps flowing backwards and forwards. If there are two distinct sets
of coils we get a two-phase current, in which there are two separate
waves, one rising as the other falls. Similarly, by using more sets of
coils, we may obtain three-phase or polyphase currents.
 Fig. 20.—Diagram showing principle of Dynamo
producing Continuous Current.

Alternating current is unsuitable for certain purposes, such as

electroplating; and by making a small alteration in our dynamo we
get a continuous or direct current, which does not reverse its
direction. Fig. 20 shows the new arrangement. Instead of the two
rings in Fig. 19, we have now a single ring divided into two parts,
each half being connected to one end of the revolving coil. Each
brush, therefore, remains on one portion of the ring for half a
revolution, and then passes over on to the other portion. During one
half-revolution we will suppose the current to be flowing from brush
B¹ in the direction of the lamp. Then during the next half-revolution
the current flows in the opposite direction; but brush B¹ has passed
on to the other half of the ring, and so the current is still leaving by it.
In this way the current must always flow in the same direction in the
main circuit, leaving by brush B¹ and returning by brush B². This
arrangement for making the alternating current into a continuous
current is called a commutator.

PLATE IV.

By permission of Lancashire Dynamo & Motor Co. Ltd.

A TYPICAL DYNAMO AND ITS PARTS.

 In actual practice a dynamo has a set of electro-magnets, and
the armature consists of many coils of wire mounted on a core of
iron, which has the effect of concentrating the lines of force. The
armature generally revolves in small dynamos, but in large ones it is
usually a fixture, while the electro-magnets revolve. Plate IV. shows
a typical dynamo and its parts.
As we saw in an earlier chapter, an electro-magnet has magnetic
powers only while a current is being passed through its winding, and
so some means of supplying current to the electro-magnets in a
dynamo must be provided. It is a remarkable fact that it is almost
impossible to obtain a piece of iron which has not some traces of
magnetism, and so when a dynamo is first set up there is often
sufficient magnetism in the iron of the electro-magnets to produce a
very weak field. The rapid cutting of the feeble lines of force of this
field sets up a weak current, which, acting upon the electro-magnets,
gradually brings them up to full strength. Once the dynamo is
generating current it keeps on feeding its magnets by sending either
the whole or a part of its current through them. After it has once been
set going the dynamo is always able to start again, because the
magnet cores retain enough magnetism to set up a weak field. If
there is not enough magnetism in the cores to start a dynamo for the
first time, a current from some outside source is sent round the
magnets.
The foregoing remarks apply to continuous current dynamos
only. Alternating current can be used for exciting electro-magnets,
but in this case the magnetic field produced is alternating also, so
that each pole of the magnet has north and south magnetism
alternately. This will not do for dynamo field magnets, and therefore
an alternating current dynamo cannot feed its own magnets. The
electro-magnets in such dynamos are supplied with current from a
separate continuous current dynamo, which may be of quite small
size.
It is a very interesting fact that electric current can be generated
by a dynamo in which the earth itself is used to provide the magnetic
field, no permanent or electro-magnets being used at all. A simple
form of dynamo of this kind consists of a rectangular loop of copper
wire rotating about an axis pointing east and west, so that the loop
cuts the lines of force of the Earth’s magnetic field.
The dynamo provides us with a constant supply of electric
current, but this current is no use unless we can make it do work for
us. If we reverse the usual order of things in regard to a dynamo,
and supply the machine with current instead of mechanical power,
we find that the armature begins to revolve rapidly, and the machine
is no longer a dynamo, but has become an electric motor. This
shows us that an electric motor is simply a dynamo reversed. Let us
suppose that we wish to use the dynamo in Fig. 20 as a motor. In
order to supply the current we will take away the lamp and substitute
a second continuous-current dynamo. We know from Chapter VII.
that when a current is sent through a coil of wire the coil becomes a
magnet with a north and a south pole. The coil in our dynamo
becomes a magnet as soon as the current is switched on, and the
attraction between its poles and the opposite poles of the magnet
causes it to make half a revolution. At this point the commutator
reverses the current, and consequently the polarity of the coil, so
that there is now repulsion where previously there was attraction,
and the coil makes another half-revolution. So the process goes on
until the armature attains a very high speed. In general construction
there is practically no difference between a dynamo and a motor, but
there are differences in detail which adapt each to its own particular
work. By making certain alterations in their construction electric
motors can be run with alternating current.
The fact that a dynamo could be reversed and run as a motor
was known probably as early as 1838, but the great value of this
reversibility does not seem to have been realized until 1873. At an
industrial exhibition held at Vienna in that year, it so happened that a
workman or machinery attendant connected two cables to a dynamo
which was standing idle, and he was much surprised to find that it at
once began to revolve at a great speed. It was then seen that the
cables led to another dynamo which was running, and that the
current from this source had made the first dynamo into a motor.
There are many versions of this story, but the important point in all is
that this was the first occasion on which general attention was drawn
to the possibilities of the electric motor.
The practical advantages afforded by the electric motor are
many and great. Once we have installed a sufficiently powerful
dynamo and a steam or other engine to drive it, we can place motors
just where they are required, either close to the dynamo or miles
away, driving them simply by means of a connecting cable. In
factories, motors can be placed close to the machines they are
required to drive, anywhere in the building, thus doing away with all
complicated and dangerous systems of shafting and belts. In many
cases where it would be either utterly impossible or at least
extremely inconvenient to use any form of steam, gas, or oil engine,
electric motors can be employed without the slightest difficulty. In
order to realize this, one only has to think of the positions in which
electrically-driven ventilating fans are placed, or of the unpleasantly
familiar electric drill of the dentist. An electric motor is small and
compact, gives off no fumes and practically no heat, makes very little
noise, is capable of running for very long periods at high speed and
with the utmost steadiness, and requires extremely little attention.
 CHAPTER X
ELECTRIC POWER STATIONS

It is apparently a very simple matter to fit up a power station with a

number of very large dynamos driven by powerful engines, and to
distribute the current produced by these dynamos to all parts of a
town or district by means of cables, but as a matter of fact it is a
fairly complicated engineering problem. First of all the source of
power for driving the dynamos has to be considered. In private and
other small power plants, gas, petrol or oil engines are generally
used, but for large stations the choice lies between steam and water
power. In this country steam power is used almost exclusively.
Formerly the ordinary reciprocating steam engines were always
employed, and though these are still in very extensive use, they are
being superseded in many cases by steam turbines. The turbine is
capable of running at higher speeds than the reciprocating engine,
and at the greatest speeds it runs with a great deal less noise, and
with practically no vibration at all. More than this, turbines take up
much less room, and require less oil and attendance. The turbines
are coupled directly to the dynamos, so that the two machines
appear almost as one. In the power station shown on Plate V. a
number of alternating current dynamos coupled to steam turbines
are seen.
A large power station consumes enormous quantities of coal,
and for convenience of supply it is situated on the bank of a river or
canal, or, if neither of these is available, as close to the railway as
possible. The unloading of the coal barges or trucks is done
mechanically, the coal passing into a large receiving hopper. From
here it is taken to another hopper close to the furnaces by means of
coal elevators and conveyors, which consist of a number of buckets
fixed at short intervals on an endless travelling chain. From the
furnace hopper the coal is fed into the furnaces by mechanical
stokers, and the resulting ash and clinker falls into a pit below the
furnaces, from which it is carted away.
The heat produced in the furnaces is used to generate steam,
and from the boilers the steam passes to the engines along a steam
pipe. After doing its work in the engines, the steam generally passes
to a condenser, in which it is cooled to water, freed from oil and
grease, and returned to the boilers to be transformed once more into
steam. As this water from the condenser is quite warm, less heat is
required to raise steam from it than would be the case if the boiler
supply were kept up with cold water. The power generated by the
engines is used to drive the dynamos, and stout copper cables
convey the current from these to what are called “bus” bars. There
are two of these, one receiving the positive cable from the dynamos,
and the other the negative cable, and the bars run from end to end of
a large main switchboard. From this switchboard the current is
distributed by other cables known as feeders.
The nature of the current generated at a power station is
determined to a great extent by the size of the district to be supplied.
Generally speaking, where the current is not to be transmitted
beyond a radius of about two miles from the station, continuous
current is generated; while alternating current is employed for the
supply of larger areas. In some cases both kinds of current are
generated at one station.
 PLATE V.

By permission of C. A. Parsons & Co.

LOTS ROAD ELECTRIC POWER STATION, CHELSEA.

If continuous current is to be used, it is generated usually at a

pressure of from 400 to 500 volts, the average being about 440 volts;
and the supply is generally on what is known as the three-wire
system. Three separate wires are employed. The two outer wires are
connected respectively to the positive and the negative bus bars
running along the main switchboard, these bars receiving positive or
negative current directly from the dynamos. The outer wires
therefore carry current at the full voltage of the system. Between
them is a third and smaller wire, connected to a third bar, much
smaller than the outer bars, and known as the mid-wire bar. This bar
is not connected to the dynamos, but to earth, by means of a large
plate of copper sunk into the ground. Connexion between the mid-
wire bar and the outer bars is made by two machines called
“balancers,” one connecting the mid-wire bar and the positive bus
bar, and the other the mid-wire bar and the negative bus bar. If the
pressure between the outer bars is 440 volts, then the pressure
between the mid-wire bar and either of the outer bars will be 220
volts, that is just half.
The balancers serve the purpose of balancing the voltage on
each side, and they are machines capable of acting either as motors
or dynamos. In order to comply with Board of Trade regulations,
electric appliances of all kinds intended for ordinary domestic
purposes, including lamps, and heating and cooking apparatus, are
supplied with current at a pressure not exceeding 250 volts. In a
system such as we are describing, all these appliances are
connected between the mid-wire and one or other of the outer wires,
thus receiving current at 220 volts. In practice it is impossible to
arrange matters so that the lamps and other appliances connected
with the positive side of the system shall always take the same
amount of current as those connected with the negative side, and
there is always liable to be a much greater load on one side or the
other. If, for instance, a heavy load is thrown on the negative side,
the voltage on that side will drop. The balancer on the positive side
then acts as an electric motor, drives the balancer on the negative
side as a dynamo, and thus provides the current required to raise the
voltage on the negative side until the balance is restored. The
working of the balancers, which need not be described in further
detail, is practically automatic. Electric motors, for driving electric
trams or machinery of any kind, are connected between the outer
wires, so that they receive the full 440 volts of the system.
In any electric supply system the demand for current does not
remain constant, but fluctuates more or less. For instance, in a
system including an electric tramway, if a car breaks down and
remains a fixture for a short time, all cars behind it are held up, and a
long line of cars is quickly formed. When the breakdown is repaired,
all the cars start practically at the same instant, and consequently a
sudden and tremendous demand for current is made. In a very large
tramway system in a fairly level city, the fluctuations in the demand
for current, apart from accidents, are not very serious, for they tend
to average themselves; but in a small system, and particularly if the
district is hilly, the fluctuations are very great, and the current
demand may vary as much as from 400 to 2000 amperes. Again, in
a system supplying power and light, the current demand rises rapidly
as the daylight fails on winter afternoons, because, while workshop
and other motors are still in full swing, thousands of electric lamps
are switched on more or less at the same time. The power station
must be able to deal with any exceptional demands which are likely
to occur, and consequently more current must be available than is
actually required under average conditions. Instead of having
generating machinery large enough to meet all unusual demands,
the generators at a station using continuous current may be only of
sufficient size to supply a little more than the average demand, any
current beyond this being supplied by a battery of storage cells. The
battery is charged during periods when the demand for current is
small, and when a heavy load comes on, the current from the battery
relieves the generators of the sudden strain. To be of any service for
such a purpose the storage battery of course must be very large.
Plate VI. shows a large battery of no cells, and some idea of the size
of the individual cells may be obtained from the fact that each weighs
about 3900 lb.
Alternating current is produced at almost all power stations
supplying large districts. It is generated at high pressure, from 2000
volts upwards, the highest pressure employed in this country being
about 11,000 volts. Such pressures are of course very much too high
for electric lamps or motors, and the object of generating current of
this kind is to secure the greatest economy in transmission through
the long cables. Electric energy is measured in watts, the watts
being obtained by multiplying together the pressure or voltage of the
current, and its rate of flow or amperage. From this it will be seen
that, providing the product of voltage and amperage remains the
same, it makes no difference, so far as electric energy is concerned,
whether the current be of high voltage and low amperage, or of low
voltage and high amperage. Now in transmitting a current through a
long cable, there is a certain amount of loss due to the heating of the
conductor. This heating is caused by the current flow, not by the
pressure; and the heavier the current, the greater the heating, and
the greater the loss. This being so, it is clear that by decreasing the
current flow, and correspondingly increasing the pressure, the loss in
transmission will be reduced; and this is why alternating current is
generated at high pressure when it is to be transmitted to a distance.
The kind of alternating current generated is usually that known
as three-phase current. Formerly single-phase current was in
general use, but it has been superseded by three-phase current
because the latter is more economical to generate and to distribute,
and also more satisfactory for electric motors. The actual voltage of
the current sent out from the station varies according to the distance
to which the current is to be conveyed. In the United States and in
other countries where current has to be conveyed to places a
hundred or even more miles from the station, pressures as high as
120,000 volts are in use. It is possible to produce alternating current
at such pressures directly from the dynamos, but in practice this is
never done, on account of the great liability to breakdown of the
insulation. Instead, the current is generated at from 2000 to 10,000
or 11,000 volts, and raised to the required pressure, before leaving
the station, by means of a step-up transformer. We have seen that
an induction coil raises, or steps up, the voltage of the current
supplied to it. A step-up transformer works on the same principle as
the induction coil, and in passing through it the current is raised in
voltage, but correspondingly lowered in amperage. Of course, if the
pressure of the current generated by the dynamos is already
sufficiently high to meet the local requirements, the transformer is
not used.
 PLATE VI.

By permission of Chloride Electrical Storage Co. Ltd.

POWER STATION BATTERY OF ACCUMULATORS.

For town supply the current from the power station is led along
underground cables to a number of sub-stations, situated in different
parts of the town, and generally underground. At each sub-station
the current passes through a step-down transformer, which also acts
on the principle of the induction coil, but in the reverse way, so that
the voltage is lowered instead of being raised. From the transformer
the current emerges at the pressure required for use, but it is still
alternating current; and if it is desired to have a continuous-current
supply this alternating current must be converted. One of the
simplest arrangements for this purpose consists of an electric motor
and a dynamo, the two being coupled together. The motor is
constructed to run on the alternating current from the transformer,
and it drives the dynamo, which is arranged to generate continuous
current. There is also a machine called a “rotary converter,” which is
largely used instead of the motor generator. This machine does the
work of both motor and dynamo, but its action is too complicated to
be described here. From the sub-stations the current, whether
converted or not, is distributed as required by a network of
underground cables.
In many parts of the world, especially in America, water power is
utilized to a considerable extent instead of steam for the generation
of electric current. The immense volume of water passing over the
Falls of Niagara develops energy equal to about seven million horse-
power, and a small amount of this energy, roughly about three-
quarters of a million horse-power, has been harnessed and made to
produce electric current for light and power. The water passes down
a number of penstocks, which are tubes or tunnels about 7 feet in
diameter, lined with brick and concrete; and at the bottom of these
tubes are placed powerful water turbines. The falling water presses
upon the vanes of the turbines, setting them revolving at great
speed, and the power produced in this way is used to drive a series
of very large alternating current dynamos. The current is conveyed at
a pressure of about 60,000 volts to various towns within a radius of
200 or 300 miles, and it is anticipated that before very long the
supply will be extended to towns still more distant. Many other
American rivers have been harnessed in a similar way, though not to
the same extent; and Switzerland and Norway are utilizing their
water power on a rapidly increasing scale. In England, owing to the
abundance of coal, little has been done in this direction. Scotland is
well favoured in the matter of water power, and it is estimated that
the total power available is considerably more than enough to run
the whole of the railways of that country. Very little of this power has
been utilized however, and the only large hydro-electric installation is
the one at Kinlochleven, in Argyllshire. It is a mistake to suppose that
water power means power for nothing, but taking things all round the
cost of water power is considerably lower than that of steam.
 CHAPTER XI
ELECTRICITY IN LOCOMOTION

The electric tramcar has become such a necessary feature of our

everyday life that it is very difficult to realize how short a time it has
been with us. To most of us a horse-drawn tramcar looks like a relic
of prehistoric times, and yet it is not so many years since the horse
tram was in full possession of our streets. Strikes of tramway
employees are fortunately rare events, but a few have occurred
during the past two or three years in Leeds and in other towns, and
they have brought home to us our great dependence upon the
electric tram. During the Leeds strike the streets presented a most
curious appearance, and the city seemed to have made a jump
backward to fifty years ago. Every available article on wheels was
pressed into service to bring business men into the city from the
outlying districts, and many worthy citizens were seen trying to look
dignified and unconcerned as they jogged along in conveyances
which might have come out of the Ark. On such an occasion as this,
if we imagine the electric light supply stopped also, we can form
some little idea of our indebtedness to those who have harnessed
electricity and made it the greatest power of the twentieth century.
There are three distinct electric tramway systems; the trolley or
overhead system, the surface contact system, and the conduit
system. The trolley system has almost driven the other two from the
field, and it is used almost exclusively throughout Great Britain and
Ireland. On the Continent and in the United States the conduit
system still survives, but probably it will not be long before the trolley
system is universally employed.
The superiority of the trolley system lies in the fact that it is
cheaper to construct and to maintain than the other two, and also in