Ely.
The Geometrical pillar but seldom retains the detached shaft. Its section is perhaps more usually a quatrefoil than any other single form; but there are countless varieties, the mouldings always of course following the style to which they belong. The accompanying example is from St. Asaph. The Decorated pillar is equally various in section; where it is moulded, the ogee usually forms part of it, but in small and plain examples it is very frequently a simple octagon. In the Perpendicular the pillar follows the general poverty of the style, but it is also distinguished by the base being stilted; by the outer mouldings being continuous, and the inner order only being carried by an attached shaft with a capital; and by its being narrower from east to west than from north to south. The exceptions, however, to all these rules are so numerous, that they could only be represented by many illustrations.
St. Asaph.
PINNACLE. A small spire-like termination to a buttress, or to any decorative shaft rising above the parapet. In buttresses, especially flying buttresses, the pinnacles are of great use in resisting the outward pressure by their weight. They do not occur in Norman architecture; they are, in fact, a correlative of the pointed arch.
The pinnacle at the temple at Jerusalem was probably the gallery, or parapet, or wall on the top of the buttresses, which surrounded the roof of the temple, properly so called. Josephus tells us that the roof of the temple was defended by pretty tall golden spikes, to hinder birds from alighting thereon. It was not on the roof of the temple that Jesus Christ was placed, but on the wall that surrounded the roof.—Calmet’s Dict. of the Bible, ed. Taylor.
PISCINA. Originally signified a fishpond; and in a secondary sense, any vessel for holding or receiving water. A water drain, usually accompanied with decorative features, near the altar, on the south side. The piscina is often the only remaining indication of the place where an altar has been. Some churches have double piscinas.
PISCIS, PISCICULI, and VESICA PISCIS. The fish is an hieroglyphic of Jesus Christ, very common in the remains of Christian art, both primitive and mediæval. The origin of it is as follows:—From the name and title of our blessed Lord, Ἰησοῦς Χριστὺς Θεοῦ Ὑιὸς Σωτὴρ, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Saviour, the early Christians, taking the first letter of each word, formed the name ἸΧΘΥΣ, Piscis, a fish. From this name of our blessed Lord, Christians also came to be called Pisciculi, fishes, with reference to their regeneration in the waters of baptism, consecrated to that effect by our blessed Lord, the mystical ἸΧΘΥΣ. Thus Tertullian, speaking of Christians, says, “for we, after our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, our ἸΧΘΥΣ, are also fishes, and born in the water; nor are we otherwise saved but by remaining in the water.” The Vesica Piscis, which is the figure of an oval, generally pointed at either end, and which is much used as the form of the seals of religious houses, and to enclose figures of Jesus Christ, or of the saints, also has its rise from this name of our blessed Lord: though some say, that the mystical Vesica Piscis has no reference, except in its name, to a fish, but represents the almond, the symbol of virginity and self-production. Clement of Alexandria, in writing of the ornaments which a Christian may consistently wear, mentions the fish as a proper device for a ring, and says, that it may serve to remind the Christian of the origin of his spiritual life.
PIUS IV. (See Creed.)