GABION (a French word derived through Ital. gabbione, gabbia, from Lat. cavea, a cage), a cylindrical basket without top or bottom, used in revetting fortifications and for numerous other purposes of military engineering. The gabion is filled with earth when in position. The ordinary brushwood gabion in the British service has a diameter of 2 ft. and a height of 2 ft. 9 in. There are several forms of gabion in use, the best known being the Willesden paper band gabion and the Jones iron or steel band gabion.
GABLE, in architecture, the upper portion of a wall from the level of the eaves or gutter to the ridge of the roof. The word is a southern English form of the Scottish gāvel, or of an O. Fr. word gable or jable, both ultimately derived from O. Norwegian gafl. In other Teutonic languages, similar words, such as Ger. Gabel and Dutch gaffel, mean “fork,” cf. Lat. gabalus, gallows, which is Teutonic in origin; “gable” is represented by such forms as Ger. Giebel and Dutch gevel. According to the New English Dictionary the primary meaning of all these words is probably “top” or “head,” cf. Gr. κεφαλή, and refers to the forking timbers at the end of a roof. The gable corresponds to the pediment in classic buildings where the roof was of low pitch. If the roof is carried across on the top of the wall so that the purlins project beyond its face, they are masked or hidden by a “barge board,” but as a rule the roof butts up against the back of the wall which is raised so as to form a parapet. In the middle ages the gable end was invariably parallel to the roof and was crowned by coping stones properly weathered on both sides to throw off the rain. In the 16th century in England variety was given to the outline of the gable by a series of alternating semi-circular and ogee curves. In Holland, Belgium and Scotland a succession of steps was employed, which in the latter country are known as crow gables or corbie steps. In Germany and the Netherlands in the 17th and 18th centuries the step gables assume very elaborate forms of an extremely rococo character, and they are sometimes of immense size, with windows in two or three storeys. Designs of a similar rococo character are found in England, but only in crestings such as those which surmount the towers of Wollaton and the gatehouse of Hardwick Hall.
Gabled Towers, in architecture, are those towers which are finished with gables instead of parapets, as at Sompting, Sussex. Many of the German Romanesque towers are gabled.
GABLER, GEORG ANDREAS (1786-1853), German Hegelian philosopher, son of J.P. Gabler (below), was born on the 30th of July 1786, at Altdorf in Bavaria. In 1804 he accompanied his father to Jena, where he completed his studies in philosophy and law, and became an enthusiastic disciple of Hegel. After holding various educational appointments, he was in 1821 appointed rector of the Bayreuth gymnasium, and in 1830 general superintendent of schools. In 1835 he succeeded Hegel in the Berlin chair. He died at Teplitz on the 13th of September 1853. His works include Lehrbuch d. philos. Propädeutik (1st vol., Erlangen, 1827), a popular exposition of the Hegelian system; De verae philosophiae erga religionem Christianam pietate (Berlin, 1836), and Die Hegel’sche Philosophie (ib., 1843), a defence of the Hegelian philosophy against Trendelenburg.
GABLER, JOHANN PHILIPP (1753-1826), German Protestant theologian of the school of J.J. Griesbach and J.G. Eichhorn, was born at Frankfort-on-Main on the 4th of June 1753. In 1772 he entered the university of Jena as a theological student. In 1776 he was on the point of abandoning theological pursuits, when the arrival of Griesbach inspired him with new ardour. After having been successively Repetent in Göttingen and teacher in the public schools of Dortmund (Westphalia) and Altdorf (Bavaria), he was, in 1785, appointed second professor of theology in the university of Altdorf, whence he was translated to a chair in Jena in 1804, where he succeeded Griesbach in 1812. Here he died on the 17th of February 1826. At Altdorf Gabler published (1791-1793) a new edition, with introduction and notes, of Eichhorn’s Urgeschichte; this was followed, two years afterwards, by a supplement entitled Neuer Versuch über die mosaische Schöpfungsgeschichte. He was also the author of many essays which were characterized by much critical acumen, and which had considerable influence on the course of German thought on theological and Biblical questions. From 1798 to 1800 he was editor of the Neuestes theologisches Journal, first conjointly with H.K.A. Hänlein (1762-1829), C.F. von Ammon (1766-1850) and H.E.G. Paulus, and afterwards unassisted; from 1801 to 1804 of the Journal für theologische Litteratur; and from 1805 to 1811 of the Journal für auserlesene theologische Litteratur.
Some of his essays were published by his sons (2 vols., 1831); and a memoir appeared in 1827 by W. Schröter.