ALBERT LENOIR, 1852
We do not know what specific prototypes Keller had in
mind when he explained the St. Gall house as the descendant
of an oriental courtyard house, but once this idea was
suggested it was inevitable that the design of the St. Gall
house should also be connected with that of the Roman
atrium house. This idea was pursued in 1852 by Albert
Lenoir.[3]
Lenoir derived the St. Gall house from a subvariety
of the Roman atrium house that Vitruvius had
called "Tuscan" (tuscanum)—a house with an open inner
court which was partially roofed over (fig. 265), but which
retained in its center a large rectangular "rainhole"
(compluvium) and on the ground below it, the classical
Roman rain catch basin (impluvium).
To the difficulties of Keller's reconstruction, Lenoir
thus added a further one, since testu[do] can be translated
as neither "rainhole" nor "catch basin." Whatever the
specific implications of this term may be, its basic meaning,
"tortoise" or "turtle shell," points in the opposite direction,
namely, to that of a protective shield or cover.[4]
