Tuscan order A plain astragal or taenia ringed the column beneath its plain cap. Palladio agreed in essence with Serlio: "The Tuscan, being rough, is rarely used above ground except in one-storey buildings like villa barns or in huge structures like Amphitheatres and the like which, having many orders, can take this one in place of the Doric, under the Ionic." Unlike the other authors Palladio found Roman precedents, of which he named the arena of Verona and the Pula Arena, both of which, James Ackerman points out, are arcuated buildings that did not present columns and entablatures. A striking feature is
Tuscan order largely motivated by nationalism. Sebastiano Serlio described five orders including a "Tuscan order", "the solidest and least ornate", in his fourth book of "Regole generali di architettura sopra le cinque maniere de gli edifici" (1537). Though Fra Giocondo had attempted a first illustration of a Tuscan capital in his printed edition of Vitruvius (1511), he showed the capital with an egg and dart enrichment that belonged to the Ionic. The "most rustic" Tuscan order of Serlio was later carefully delineated by Andrea Palladio. In its simplicity, The Tuscan order is seen as similar to the Doric order, and yet in