Gambrel
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A gambrel (also known as a Dutch gambrel) is a usually-symmetrical two-sided roof with two slopes on each side. The upper slope is positioned at a shallow angle, while the lower slope is steep. This design provides the advantages of a sloped roof while maximizing headroom on the building's upper level. The name comes from the Medieval Latin word gamba, meaning horse's hock or leg.[1][2]
The cross-section of a gambrel roof is similar to that of a mansard roof, but a gambrel has vertical gable ends instead of being hipped at the four corners of the building. A gambrel roof overhangs the façade, whereas a mansard normally does not.
History
Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and English mariners and traders had visited or settled in to the area of southeast Asia now called Indonesia prior to permanent European settlement in America. In Indonesia, they saw dwellings with a roof style where the end of a roof started as a hip and finished as a gable end at the ridge. The gable end was an opening, to allow smoke to dissipate from the cooking fires. This roof design was brought back to Europe and the American Colonies, and adapted to local conditions. The roof style is still in use around the world today.[3]
Origin and use of the term
Gambrel is a Norman English word, sometimes spelled gamerel, gamrel, gambril, or gameral, referring to a wooden bar used by butchers to hang the carcasses of slaughtered animals.[1] Butcher's gambrels, later made of metal, resembled the two-sloped appearance of a gambrel roof when in use.[4] Gambrel is also a term for the joint in the upper part of a horse's hind leg, the hock. In fact, there is an old folk rhyme that says, "First joint above the hoof is the Gambrel, hence a Gambrel Roof."[citation needed]
The Dictionary of Americanisms, published in 1848, defines gambrel as "A hipped roof of a house, so called from the resemblance to the hind leg of a horse which by farriers is termed the gambrel."[5]
The term is also used for a single mansard roof in France and Germany.
References
- ^ a b Harper, Douglas. "gambrel". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 2010-11-13.
- ^ Harper, Douglas. "gambol". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 2010-11-13.
- ^ Allen, James H. (2010). Statics for Dummies. For Dummies. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley. p. 255. ISBN 978-0-470-59894-8. OCLC 505422830.
{{cite book}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - ^ US patent 1345112, W. A. Andrew, "Release gambrel", issued 1920-06-29
- ^ Bartlett, John Russell (1848). "GAMBREL". Dictionary of Americanisms: a glossary of words and phrases, usually regarded as peculiar to the United States. American culture. New York: Bartlett and Welford. p. 153. OCLC 6758564.
Bibliography
- Corkhill, Thomas (1982). "Gambrel roof". The Complete Dictionary of Wood. Scarborough Books (1st ed.). New York: Stein and Day. p. 211. ISBN 0-8128-6142-6. OCLC 12610712.
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