Porch

Porch (pronounced pawrch or pohrch)

(1) In architecture, an exterior appendage to a building, forming an approach to a doorway, now usually with a roof which may be separate or an extension of that of the main structure; if walls are included, a porch is said to be “vestibule-like”.

(2) An exterior roofed gallery, often partly enclosed; a veranda.

(3) As “the Porch”, the portico or stoa in the agora of ancient Athens, where the Stoic philosopher Zeno of Citium and his followers met.

(4) Applied loosely (often in commerce, especially the real estate business), similar structures such as porticos, balconies, decks, verandas and such.

(5) In aerospace engineering, the platform outside the external hatch of a spacecraft.

1250–1300: From the Middle English porche (covered entrance; roofed structure, usually open on the front and sides, before an entrance to a building), from the Old French porche (porch, vestibule), from the Latin porticus (covered gallery, covered walk between columns, arcade, portico, porch), from porta (city gate, gate; door, entrance), from the primitive Indo European root per- (to lead, pass over).  In the Old English the Latin form was borrowed as portic.  By the late fourteenth century, a porche was understood as a “covered walk or colonnade on the front or side of a building”; by the early 1830s it was used in the US for the structures described in the UK as verandas.  Porch and porchful are nouns, porchless, porchlike & porched are adjectives; the noun plural is porches.

Porch swingers.

Vice-Admiral William Raborn (1905-1990; Director of Central Intelligence, 1965-1966, left) and Lyndon Johnson (LBJ, 1908–1973; POTUS 1963-1969, right), sitting on porch swing on the porch of LBJ's boyhood home near Stonewall, Texas, 1965.  Admiral Raborn was a gallant sailor with a fine record but wholly was unsuited handling the politics demanded in the role of heading the CIA and served as the nation's chief spy for little more than a year.  If LBJ appears happy, it's likely because recently he'd been elected POTUS in one of the largest landslides recorded and the troubles caused by the war in Vietnam have yet to consume his presidency.

Some variants of porch are obvious: A “back porch” is a porch at the back of a structure (typically a house) while a “front porch” is at the front; any building with a porch may be described as “porched” (used usually as a modifier).  In architecture there are also what might be called “side porches” but the term is not in general use.  A structure is “porchless” if designed or built without a porch while an “outporch” is a now archaic term meaning “an exterior porch”; it’s of minor interest to historians of architecture because it suggests there was a time free-standing structures also were thought of as porches.  A “porchful” is “the quantity of stuff said to “fill a porch”, those items typically being “porch chairs” or “porch swing” (a seat with armrests and a back, built usually for two, and suspended from the ceiling with hooked chains (or cables) enabling it to rock back & forth.  Collectively such items could be styled “porch furniture” although “patio furniture”, “deck furniture” & “outdoor furniture are now in more common use.  All these pieces might be illuminated by a “porch light” (also as “porch-light” & “porch lamp”, a wall or ceiling-mounted light, often fitted with a protective grill).  Once such accessories have been placed, that constitutes one’s “porchscape” and although tables are not uncommon on larger porches, the term “porch table” seems not to be a thing.

A house with “wrap-around porch”, part of which (left) has been converted to a “sunporch” by the addition of glass panes.

The term “porchway” did not (as the name might suggest) describe an “extended or elongated porch” but was simply a synonym of porch; use is now thought archaic.  A “snow porch” was an enclosed but un-heated structure which was a feature in arctic areas or other places with very cold climates.  Snow porches were accessible from within a dwelling and typically used as storage for firewood and such, the advantage compared with an outside shed being those within didn’t have to walk outside in the cold to fetch a load.  Unlike a “sunroom” (a windowed room optimized for receiving natural light), a “sunporch” was a conventional porch to which windows (sometimes able to be opened) had been added.  In nautical use, a “wetporch” (also called a “moon pool”) was a feature in the hull of a vessel used for lowering equipment into the sea below.  Although used in a number of sub-surface environments and underwater habitats, the structures are most associated with off-shore mining and oil extraction, frequently seen on marine drilling platforms.

117 South Hervey Street, Hope, Hempstead County, Arkansas.

This is the house in which Bill Clinton (b 1946; POTUS 1993-2001) spent the first four years of his life.  In June 1997, it was opened to the public as President William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site which was a little opportunistic, his actual birth happening at Hope's now-demolished Julia Chester Hospital, the site now occupied by a funeral home.  The house's porch would be called a “front porch” and although when young Mr Clinton doubtless spent much time “on the porch”, later in life he didn't always “stay on the porch”.

A variant style was the stoop (raised open platform before the entrance of a house, approached by steps and thus neither a veranda nor a porch) and elements of the concept can be seen even in the dwellings uncovered in archaeological digs of prehistoric settlements but stoops seem first to have been so named in the mid eighteenth century to describe the feature in wooden houses in North America (including Canada which shared many of the building styles of the north-eastern US).  Stoop was from the Dutch stoep (flight of steps, doorstep, threshold), from the Middle Dutch, from Proto-Germanic stap- (step).  The Dutch form evolved in South African English as stoep, first recorded in 1797 although oral use may pre-date this.  Stoep was an element of the slur “stoep-sitter” which described a “habitually idle person who spends all day lounging on his stoep”.  Despite being a South African coining, it seems not to have been directly exclusively towards the non-white population, unlike the equivalent form from the US: “porch monkey” (a lazy black person characterized as idling away the hours sitting on a porch).  A modern coining was “porch pirate” (a criminal who practices “porch piracy”, stealing from porches packages delivered by a courier).  Although not a new class of crime, instances have soared with the increasing popularity of on-line shopping and the pattern seems mostly to be opportunistic; porch pirates driving around high-income neighborhoods and stealing whatever cartons are observed, a risky approach in the age of ubiquitous domestic CCTV systems.  However, law enforcement agencies have revealed their analysis indicates some porch piracy may be facilitated by “inside information” with porch pirates “tipped off” (by those somewhere in the supply chain) about desirable or high-value deliveries.

What used to be Standard Christian church architecture.  A narthex is a particular type of porch, many churches having a narthex and one or more porches. 

In church architecture, although Christian churches often had one or more porches, a special case was the narthex, an enclosed passage at the west end of a basilica or church, usually at right angles to the nave and located between the main entrance and the nave.  Theologically (and historically, thus socially), the significance of the narthex in many early Christian and Byzantine basilicas & churches was as well as being a conventional “lobby area”, it was place penitents were required to remain.  Although the archaeological record suggests there may have been some early churches with annexes or even small separate structures located nearby which fulfilled the latter function, narthexes seem quickly to have been integrated.  That means that structurally and architecturally, a narthex was part of the building but theologically was not, its purpose being to permit those not entitled to admission as part of the congregation (mostly catechumens and penitents) nevertheless to hear the service and (hopefully) be encouraged to reform their ways and pursue communion.  For ceremonies other than services, the narthex was otherwise a functional space, the church’s baptismal font often mounted there and in some traditions (both Eastern & Western) worshipers would sometimes anoint themselves and their children with a daub of holy water before stepping foot in the nave; some branches of the Orthodox Church use the narthex for funeral ceremonies.  There were also architectural variations in the early churches which persisted in larger building and cathedrals, the narthex divided in two, (1) an esonarthex (inner narthex) between the west wall and the body of the church proper, separated from the nave and aisles by a wall, trellis or some other means and (2) an external closed space, the exonarthex (outer narthex), a court in front of the church façade with a perimeter defined by on all sides by colonnades.

In the Western Church, reforms removed the requirement to exclude from services those who were not full members of the congregation which of course meant the narthex technically was rendered redundant.  However, the shape churches had assumed with a narthex included had become part of Church tradition so architects continued to include the space, both as part of the nave structure and something semi-separated.  They attracted a number of names, borrowed mostly from secular buildings including vestibule, porch, foyer, hallway, antechamber, anteroom, entrance, entry, entryway, gateway, hall, lobby, portal & portico, the choice dictated sometimes by local tradition, sometimes by the nature of construction and sometimes the choice seems to have been arbitrary.  In the Eastern Orthodox Church, the esonarthex and exonarthex retained distinct liturgical functions, some rituals terminating in the exonarthex while services still exclusively penitential services are usually chanted in the esonarthex.  In dialectal northern English, the casual term for the penitents forced to remain in the narthex was “the narts”.

A example of a portico: 1500 San Ysidro Drive, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles.  Lindsay Lohan livered here for a while during “troubled starlet” phase.

Because there are so many ways porchlike structures can be described, word nerds with a fondness for architecture do like to correct the linguistically sloppy.  In a diary note of 28 June, 1954, documenting an evening in the British Embassy in Washington DC, Winston Churchill’s (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) doctor (Lord Moran (Charles Wilson, 1882-1977; president of the Royal College of Physicians 1941-1949, personal physician to Winston Churchill 1940-1965) recorded telling his patient: “I hope you did not get cold sitting on the balcony in the chill night air.”  “Portico, not balcony, Charles.” he was corrected with a “mischievous smile”.

Porte-cochère of the Jing An Shangri-La Hotel, Shanghai, PRC.  This porte-cochère features what may be the ultimate porch light.  Such lighting structures have been made possible by LED (light emitting diode) technology; before LED's such a thing would have been too maintenance-intensive because of the limited life of bulbs or tubes. 

If a portico sits above a space where vehicles draw up for passengers to alight it becomes a porte-cochère, something now most associated with hotels or the forecourts of commercial buildings.  If a walkway is of any length with a roof supported by rows of pillars, that is a colonnade.  The car is a Mercedes-Benz S-Class (W221, 2005-2013, specifically, a “facelift” version (2009-2013)).  A special version of the W221 (S 300 L) was produced for markets in the Far East which combined the LWB (long wheelbase) platform with the 3.0 litre (183 cubic inch) V6; it was essentially a LWB version of the S 280 (which also, despite the name used the 3.0 V6) sold in many other markets.  The S300 L was produced for the hotel trade and other operators of limousines who didn't want either thirsty V8s or V12s or the less refined diesels.

Lindsay Lohan on a balcony.  Although in general use the terms for such structures are applied loosely, in architecture, a balcony is accessible structure extending from a building and without roof.  Even if a balcony party is covered by a small eave, it is still not a porch.

A portico is best described as an “architectural porch leading to the entrance of a building” so not exactly a “big porch” although most tend to be large scale.  A noted feature of the buildings of Antiquity, a portico is defined by having a roof structure atop a walkway and although many architecture guides insist this must be supported by supported or enclosed within walls, a roof protruding from a building with no such ground-based anchorage (a favourite trick of architects in the mid-twentieth century) can be thought a portico if there’s some sort of walkway beneath.  The essential feature is the provision of shelter from the elements.  Those seeking a bit of visual grandeur (not only the McMansion crew) sometimes will add a pediment (a triangular upper part) atop but architects caution this can look absurd or pretentious on smaller structures because the sense of proportion works best at scale.

The colloquial phrase “hard dog to keep on the porch” is a lament used (perhaps often resignedly) by women of their husband’s or boyfriend’s chronic infidelity, describing men who are unfaithful and generally “difficult to keep an eye on.”  Although long in idiomatic use in the Southern US, in 1999 it came to wider attention when used by crooked Hillary Clinton of her husband, serial philander Bill Clinton.  Crooked Hillary must have picked up the expression while living in Arkansas; she began her ascent of the political and financial ladder by marrying Bill Clinton and with every election of him there as attorney-general (1977-1979) or governor (1979-1981 & 1983-1992), voters received a free copy of crooked Hillary.  When he became POTUS, she remained part of the package as FLOTUS 1993-2001, the consensus among political scientists that “he’d never have made it without her and vice-versa”.  Wives often of course do sometimes leave husbands who refuse to “stay on the porch” but crooked Hillary stayed and that was a defensible decision because, like many transactional relationships, the choice of “stay or go” is a thing of cost-benefit analysis; in a marriage, like most of life, for everything you do there’s a price to be paid.  

Problem-solver crooked Hillary finds a solution.

Crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; FLOTUS 1993-2001, far left), Chelsea Clinton (b 1980; FDOTUS 1993-2001, centre left), Bill Clinton, centre right) and Buddy (1997-2002; FD²OTUS 1997-2001, far right), strolling over the White House lawn, prior to a two-week vacation at Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, 18 August 1998.  Unfortunately, crooked Hillary's expectation she'd found a companion loyal enough to “stay on the porch” wasn't realized, Buddy killed in a road accident outside the Clintons' home in Chappaqua, New York after running off to chase a car (though the vehicle wasn't one of the rare Monica 560s).  Whether to this day crooked Hillary blames her husband for “giving Buddy ideas” isn't known but certainly, he set the dog a bad example. 

What Can I Say (1983), original vinyl pressing by Gail Davies.  Record store staff weren’t always fastidious when applying the adhesive promotional stickers.

South of the Mason-Dixon Line, the expression must also have had some currency in the form “hard dog to keep under the porch” which indicates, at least in some cases or places, the particular significance of the architectural space was the roof rather than the floor.  The C&W (Country & Western) song You're a Hard Dog (To Keep Under the Porch) was co-written by Susanna Clark (1939–2012) and the extraordinarily prolific (credited with over 4000 C&W songs) Harlan Howard (1927-2002); it was first recorded by Gail Davies (b 1948) and released on What Can I Say (1983), her fifth studio album (a question mark not used in the album’s title).

Porch joke

An unemployed man went door-to-door, seeking jobs.  Impressed by the work-ethic, after agreeing an hourly rate, one resident handed him a brush and two large cans of green paint, telling him: “You can go and paint the porch out back.”  Three hours later the man returned and said: “I done finished the painting mister and I done a good job but I swear to you sir, that ain’t no Porsh, it be a Ferrari.”  In the original German, Porsche is pronounced with two syllables (Paw-shuh), not the sometimes heard single syllable Porsh.  In German, the final “e” is pronounced as a short uh.

Some paint required: 1954 Ferrari 500 Mondial, as sold (top left) and on-track in period (top right) and 1972 Dino 246 GT, fire damaged (bottom left) and a 1972 246 GT in Medium Green Metallizzato over Nero leather (bottom right).  It's believed the factory finished only 21 of the 2,295 246 GTs coupés or 1,274 246 GTS spyders (targas) in Medium Green Metallizzato but another shade of green, Verde Medio Nijinsky, was rarer still, only three of those leaving the line.  The Dino was advertised for sale at US$129,500 and was sold although the price paid was not disclosed.  The wrecked 500 Mondial (the second one built and one of 13 examples with Pininfarina spider coachwork) at auction in August 2023 realized US$1.875 million.  It has yet to resurface, restored or otherwise.

A classic Queenslander with the porches the locals tend to call verandas.  Many Queenslanders were built on stilts: (1) to encourage natural cooling, (2) as a form of flood mitigation, (3) to facilitate easier pest and termite control and (4) to make hilly sites adaptable to house construction.

The term “vernacular architecture” entered the jargon of the profession in 1964 after being coined by Austrian-born US architect Bernard Rudofsky (1905–1988).  It describes indigenous designs or methods of construction that evolved organically to suit local climates, available construction materials, social traditions and specific human needs.  In Queensland, Australia, the signature “vernacular architecture” was and remains the “Queenslander” although they’re less common than in their heyday.  In its classic form, a Queenslander can be imagined as a “house with a wrap-around porch” although the local term has long been “veranda”.  At scale, the style seems to have emerged in the 1840s as the optimal way, for a given footprint, to maximize air-flow and reduce internal temperatures, things of consequence in the sub-tropics and, in the age before electricity (let alone air-conditioning) much appreciated by British & European migrants from more temperate, less humid regions.  Much of Queensland also was subject to hard rain and the verandas provided expansive living, eating and even sleeping spaces which could be used rain, hail or shine.  Snow and ice rarely was an issue.

The Erechtheion and the Caryatid Porch

The Erechtheion on the Acropolis, Athens, Greece.

One of the world’s most famous porches is the most striking feature of the Erechtheion (from the Ancient Greek Ἐρέχθειον (Erékhtheion)), an Ancient Greek Ionic temple-telesterion on the north side of the Acropolis, dedicated to the goddess Athena.  Built late in the fifth century BC, the Erechtheion was one of the first major projects following the devastation of the Greco-Persian Wars, the re-building of the Acropolis thus vested with all the symbolic ambition of a “civilization reborn”.  Given that, while the mathematically precise lines of the Parthenon impart a projection of order, rationality, and imperial confidence, the Erechtheion seems architecturally anarchic but it too was a piece of messaging, preserving ancient, sacred traditions within the new Classical architectural.  Unlike so many of the neat, consistent, often symmetrical structures which have survived from Antiquity, the Erechtheion is an architectural outlier because the design needed simultaneously to solve several political, religious and topographical problems.  Even today, it would be a challenge on the site to fulfil the demands while achieving the symmetrical perfection normally associated with Classical Greek temples.  For those reasons, anyone undertaking a tour of Roman and Greek ruins would, on first sight, find the Erechtheion startling, the look fragmented and seemingly so improvised many might assume additions have over the years been “tacked-on”.  The irregularity was deliberate, the location not being dedicated to a single deity; as well as honoring King Erechtheus, the architects were compelled to incorporate several ancient cult sites and sacred objects associated with Athena, Poseidon, and a grab-bag of local heroes and ancestral cults.

From the right angle, on the right day the Erechtheion can make a memorable photograph.

Mostly though, despite the name, the myth most celebrated was the legend of the site being the place where Athena and Poseidon competed for patronage of Athens, dedicated cultists holding the soil contained physical remnants of the epic contest including a sacred salt-water spring, Poseidon’s trident mark etched in the rock and Athena’s olive tree.  Because these relics of the past were in architecturally inconvenient places, the structure of the Erechtheion had to be “built around them”, thus precluding the simple rectangular floor plan and associated motifs which are such a marker of the temples from Antiquity.  The topography was also significant, the Acropolis rock beneath sloping sharply, meaning the surface was uneven.  As a piece of civil engineering this could of course have been levelled (if one had enough time and slaves, mountains could be moved) but that would have disturbed the relics so the work proceeded on what was a most irregular surface.  That made construction more of a challenge but did result in one of Antiquity’s most striking temples, the east and west sides at different heights, the interior chambers located on floors and varied levels and porches are placed asymmetrically, one consequence being it emerging as a complex of interconnected sanctuaries rather than the more familiar, single unified hall.

Within are several shrines, the eastern section dedicated to Athena Polias (Athena of the City), while the western portions were associated with Poseidon-Erechtheus and hero cults (best thought of as “best supporting actors” in Academy Award (Oscar) terms) meaning the entrances and their associated porches and portici served different ritual functions.  Although the layout and form were dictated by circumstances, in many ways, what was done proved a harbinger for much of public architecture in the centuries to come as the shape of “multi-function” buildings began increasingly to include physical segregation between spaces in both the horizontal and vertical with separate provisions for ingress and egress.  So while not “geometrically pure” in the Greek way, there’s an organic charm to the Erechtheion although Athenian citizens upon a first sight must have thought it peculiar or even weird architecture; the “shock of the new” is not unique to modernity.

The Caryatid Porch, the Porch of the Maidens.

The structure’s most famous and oft-photographed feature is the south porch, supported by a half dozen sculpted female figures: the Caryatids.  Caryatids was from the Middle French cariatide, from the Latin caryatides, from the Ancient Greek Καρυάτιδες (Karuátides), the noun plural of Καρυᾶτις (Karuâtis) (a priestess of Artemis, female figures used as bearing-shafts), from καρυατίζω (karuatízō) (dance the Karyatid festival dance) from Καρύαι (Karúai) (a town in Laconia with a temple of Artemis and the site of festivals in her honor).  The orthodox etymology is disputed by some scholars but the literal translation of karyatides is “maidens of Karyai” (an ancient Peloponnese settlement) and the young ladies from there were legendarily beautiful & healthy (and thus ideal “breeding stock”, good genes then as sought in mothers as they were in livestock).  In the language of architecture, caryatids were sculpted female figures used as supports in the manner of a column or pillar.  By necessity of physics, most caryatids supported the entablature (all of that part of a classical temple above the capitals of the columns; includes the architrave, frieze, and cornice but not the roof) on the head rather than the raised arms often seen in free-standing statutes, this done for reasons of structural integrity rather than aesthetics although it was a nod also to the notion of the girls of Karyai often being depicted as a canephora (basket-bearer), carrying to feasts of the goddesses Athena and Artemis fruits, nuts or sacred objects in woven cane baskets they placed on their heads.

The Parthenon on the Acropolis, Athens, Greece.

The Parthenon is the classic example of the Greek temple and more representative of the type than the Erechtheion.  It was proto-second wave feminist comrade Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong 1893–1976; chairman of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) 1949-1976) who reminded Chinese men “Women hold up half the sky” although he made the famous remark in 1968 at the height of the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) which makes for an amusing historical juxtaposition.  Still, it does suggest that even if contemporary Athenians might have thought the Erechtheion a bit weird, the sight of a half-dozen young ladies holding up a roof built by a culture which was patriarchal (as was then the way) would have pleased the comrade Chairman who’d have felt assured the architects were good Maoists, the PRC’s (People’s Republic of China) first constitution (1954) implying gender equality in Article 85 (Citizens of the People's Republic of China are equal before the law) and made explicit in Article 86 (Citizens of the People's Republic of China are equal before the law) & Article 96 (Women in the People's Republic of China enjoy equal rights with men in all spheres of political, economic, cultural, social and domestic life).  Reading the PRC’s 1954 constitution, it clear the place was as much as a paradise for citizens as the Soviet Union must have been based on comrade Stalin’s (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) 1936 constitution although in Article 86 of the PRC’s document it was mentioned rights could be denied to those the state declared “insane”, a clause which proved handy over the years, as did a similar provision in the USSR.

The Parthenon, Centennial Park, Nashville, Tennessee.

Designed by architect William Crawford Smith (1837–1899), the Parthenon which stands in Centennial Park, Nashville, Tennessee, was built in 1897 as part of the Tennessee Centennial Exposition.  A full-scale reproduction of the original, it's now an art museum and in the Treasury Room are displayed plaster replicas of the Parthenon Marbles, cast from the original sculptures.  In the nineteenth century, Nashville was one of a number of cities around the world often styled "the Athens of the South" and this doubtless had some influence on the choice of the building as the exposition's centrepiece but while some of the other structures erected for the event were in the style of buildings from antiquity, the Parthenon was the only one to use exact dimensions.  The 1897 structure was intended to last only for the duration of the exposition and was thus built with plaster, wood & brick but such was the local support for its retention it was left standing, soon beginning to deteriorate.  By 1920 however it was a noted tourist attraction and had become accepted as a feature of the city so, on the same foundations, it was rebuilt in concrete, the project completed in 1931.  Concrete however doesn't possess the same qualities of durability as granite and marble so for the replica to maintain its appearance and structural integrity, progressive replacements of components will be required, engineers noting the essentially modular nature of the construction means it may never need wholly to be re-built.  If it endures long enough, it may end up as something of a Ship of Theseus.

The new headquarters of the state media’s China Daily during construction.  When finished if looked less confronting but one can see why the President Xi knew there had to be a good, hard crackdown on “weird architecture” being erected.

Much in the PRC has of course changed since comrade Chairman Mao’s time although gender equality remains constitutionally entrenched and that no women ever have made it to the Politburo’s ruling Central Committee may simply reflect them not trying hard enough, after all, during all those decades the One-Child Policy (1980-2016) was in effect, it’s not as if they could complain about the demands on their time made by raising a large family.  Still, the spirit of “Women hold up half the sky” must remain current thought in Beijing but whether President Xi Jinping (b 1953; General Secretary of the CCP & paramount leader of the PRC since 2012) would have approved of either the maidens of the Caryatid Porch "holding up all the roof" or the Erechtheion’s many other architectural idiosyncrasies may be doubtful.  As early as 2014, not best pleased by the stylistic exuberance seen in China's recent skyscrapers, Mr Xi called for an end to what he called “weird architecture”, telling planners buildings should be “suitable, economic, green and pleasing to the eye” rather than “oversized, xenocentric & weird”.  It might be concluded that while he’d have admired the elegant simplicity of the lines of the Parthenon, Mr Xi would have used of the Erechtheion the same critique he may (in words echoing an earlier critic of aesthetics) have levelled at what he was seeing on the Beijing skyline: “muddle, chaotic, dissonant, confused and intentionally ugly”.  China’s architects he may have accused of building stuff that was “weird” but, well-skilled at reading between the CCP's lines, they’d have understood they’d just been labeled “formalists”.  Carefully, they took note.

Now replicas but, thousands of years on, still doing the job.

Although at the time the caryatids were a highly unconventional addition to a major temple, as an architectural motif, they were not unique as replacements for columns or pillars, the later male versions being the telamon or atlas; unlike the caryatids, the male analogues sometimes were carved on a vast scale.  Nor was the structural technique only anthropomorphic, roofs sometimes supported by renderings in the shape of swords, serpents, fish or other wildlife although what some Instagrammers may not realize is the figures today dutifully holding up the roof of the Erechtheion’s Caryatid Porch are immaculately rendered reproductions, the originals safely preserved as displays in the Acropolis Museum except for one which sits in the British Museum.  That one was “obtained” by Lord Elgin (1766–1841) during his expeditions to Greece between 1800-1803 when he “purchased” (disputed by the government of Greece which suggests something like “plundered”) what came to be known as the “Elgin Marbles”.

Veavage

Veavage (pronounced vee-vig)

(1) The expanse of bare skin a woman displays when wearing a dress (or top) with a neckline cut in a deep (often called plunging) “V”, the vertex (the bottom junction where the two diagonal strokes meet) typically reaching the midriff but the lines can intersect as low as the waist or even the hipline.  As a design, it’s the familiar “V-neckline” taken to its logical conclusion although much the same can be achieved with what technically are “scalloped necklines” or “U-plunges”.

(2) As “veavage dress”, “veavage top” etc, a garment so designed.

2026 (2010 for an earlier, now extinct purpose): A portmanteau word, the construct being ve(e) + (cle)avage.  In English, vee had a long history as an illustration of the pronunciation for the letter “V” but it was in US English in the mid-1860s it began widely to be used in building, architecture and engineering to describe various structures, components or configurations.  Because of the attractive properties of triangles, the “V-shape” would for millennia have been part of the man-made environment (indeed, it exists in botany, animals and geology) but the form “vee” appears in this context to have been well documented only from the mid-nineteenth century and use as a direct substitute for the Latin script letter “V/v” is documented from 1869.  In internal combustion engines, “vee” seems first used of piston engines in this configuration by 1915 although the first known V-twin was built in 1889 and the first V8 in 1903.  Although common as a descriptor of shapes or physical objects, the more abstract re-purposings included (1) a polyamorous relationship between three people, in which one person has two partners who are not themselves romantically or sexually involved and (2) in the (male) gay community, “a Vee” is a verbal shorthand for “a versatile” (one who is not exclusively “a top” (or “pitcher”) or “a “bottom” (or “catcher”) but indulges in both practices.  The coining is too recent for derived forms to have emerged but the possibilities include veavaged, veavaging and veavesque.  Veavage is a noun (and potentially a verb & adjective); the noun plural is veavages.

Of Vee

Cricket's “vee”, recommended for “high-percentage” shots.

Teevee was a respelling of the abbreviation TV (for television) so the two are synonymous but the former (with its four superfluous vowels) survived only as a “niche word”.  In the era between the early post-war years and services like YouTube and its many imitators becoming mainstream, a “teeveen” was a young person who “watched too much TV”.  In SF (sci-fi, science fiction) a three-vee was a screen able to display in three-dimensions; authors used also “3v”, “tri-v” “tri-vid”, “tri-d”, “trideo” & “tridim” and although they didn’t show quite the disdain for capitalization as later would emerge in the business of computer hardware & software, the literary preference seems to have tended to the lower case.  The humorists of the 1980s used a mix of upper and lower when creating shorthand critiques of the US cable television channel (1981) MTV (pronounced emm-tee-vee and an initialism of “Music Television”).  Claiming the channel’s programming was banal, they conjured up “eMpTyV”, “empty-vee”, “Empty-V”, “Emptyv”, “emptyV” & “eMpTy V”, all to be pronounced emp-tee-vee.  That was a variant of the technique used to produce rebus abbreviations (in structural linguistics technically a “gramogram”) such as “NRG” for “energy” or “XLR8” for “accelerate”.  All worked best when written because although non none possessed classic phonetic assimilation, sloppiness in real world use, sloppiness in pronunciation probably often rendered the sound of emm-tee-vee vs emp-tee-vee indistinguishable.  In cricket, the “vee” describes the arc of the field, forward of the batter, from cover to midwicket, in which drives classically are played (a shape better visualized as an “L” because, like many “vee” engines, the vertex is a 90^o angle) and coaches still instruct batters to “play in the vee” because that’s most productive for “high percentage” (ie more runs, fewer dismissals) shots but in the newer, shorter forms of the game, that’s now less relevant.  Whether “veagage” catches as jargon for coaches advocating “playing in the vee” remains to be seen.

Playing in the vee.  Australian cricketer Ellyse Perry (b 1990) with the trophies of the two Cricket Australia (the new name for the old Board of Control) Cricketer of the Year awards she won in 2023 (in the T20 and ODI (One Day International) categories). Note the splendid shoulder & upper-arm muscle definition.

In typography & computing, typography, a “vee” was a unit of vertical spacing, typically corresponding to the height of an ordinary line of text.  In machinery, a vee-belt (often as v-belt) was a drive-belt of reinforced rubber or other compounds which was mounted on drive wheels or pullies, the name gained from the V-shaped cross-section (some with notches which were called “toothed belts”).   “Vee Dub” was a slang term for a vehicle produced by Volkswagen (VW) and a “Vee Dubber” was a VW fan boy (some of whom were girls).  A “veejay” was the host of a television programme who presented videos, based on the earlier “DJ” (disc jockey, a radio presenter who introduced music broadcast by playing tracks from discs, a use which has survived many DJs now operating without discs).  A VJ was also a “vertical joist” which was a length of timber used as a vertical upright for structural support.  In vulgar slang, “VJ” also was a term for the vulva or vagina and the user-generated Urban Dictionary has an entry from 2010 listing “veavage” with the construct v(aginal) + (cl)eavage (ie the infamous “camel toe”) but that attracted negligible support.  A veep is “a vice-president”, a form popular use has made associated mostly with the VPOTUS (vice-president of the US).  

Of Veagage

Actor Keira Knightley (b 1985) in a classic black veavage dress, illustrating how the emphasis has shifted to skin rather than cleavage, the latter the traditional focus of the deeper “V-necklines”, things now done with “a hint”: less is more.

With due acknowledgment of the use in 2010 (documented by Urban Dictionary) which never gained traction, “veavage” is a new word but what it describes is not new though the emphasis genuinely is a variation of an old theme.  Veagage is a deeply plunging V-shaped cut in a garment which displays some of the chest & midriff down sometimes as far as the hipline although most stop at the waist.  Obviously something best worn on red carpets or for photo-shoots in controlled environments (light, surface irregularities, wind-speed & direction, crowds etc), it differs from the traditional approach to the female chest in that emphasis is on the skin rather than the breasts, the veagage look de-emphasising those glands so the cut is ideal for those able to summon much of a cleavage only with structural engineering such as a bra or Hollywood Tape (better known by the more evocative “tit-tape”).  So it can be a good, eye-catching choice for those without the anatomical advantage demanded by outfits optimized for “peak cleavage” but it has been criticized as a form of “privilege-dressing”, said to carry the whiff of “white feminism”.

Controversial and not accepted by all as something “real”, “white feminism” is said to be a fork of feminism concerned almost exclusively with concerns of white, middle-class, cisgender, heterosexual women, the problems of women not ticking those boxes ignored.  It’s thus an individualistic strain of feminism which aims to maximize one’s advantage within existing systems rather than seeking systemic reform for the collective benefit.  From there it may seem a bit of a leap to veagage as marker of political exclusion but it’s true a link can be constructed if one wishes to find such a connection (the notion of v=(c+p) (cleavage + privilege = veavage)) in that while it accommodates at least some on the spectrum of breast size, slenderness is essential and for those not genetically lucky or disciplined, there are the GLP-1 (Glucagon-like peptide-1) drugs and overwhelmingly, they remain a tool for those who are (in global terms) “rich”.  Like everything else, the frock is political.

Lindsay Lohan, Olympus Fashion Week, Bryant Park, Manhattan, February 2006.  Although Ms Lohan is more associated with the traditional use of the V-neckline, this is archetypical veavage.

Unlike some “straight-line letters” such as “W” or “X”, the letter “V” is almost always rendered with straight lines but fashion editors are more forgiving than geometers (since the time of the third century BC mathematician of Ancient Greece Euclid, the historic term for those whose primary research field was geometry) who would insist the plunging neckline of Ms Lohan’s red dress is not a “V” but a “curvilinear angle” (an angle with sides of curves rather than straight line segments).  In elementary geometry, the classic angle consists of two straight rays meeting at a vertex, whereas in a curvilinear angle the sides are arcs or other curves intersecting at a point.  In fashion, up to a certain stage, a “curvilinear angle” is still a “V-neckline” because the visual effect is so close but, as the curves become more curved, at some point the cut becomes closed to a “scallop” or “scoop” and is so described.

Model & writer Hari Nef (b 1992) in Schiaparelli.  Like the trade-off in warship design between armor & speed, less gland means more veavage so those not best suited to cleavage in a V-neckline have an alternative.

So with V-shaped necklines descending to the navel (or a little beyond) hardly a novelty given their not infrequent appearances over the last two-decades-odd, why did the word “veavage” suddenly make an appearance in 2026?  The obvious answer is of course “click-bait” but that’s not of necessity a bad thing because, in a sense, that trick is supply anticipating demand and there are aspects of the internet (which at least for now seem to have become structural) that should arouse more concern.  It’s a good word and a welcome addition to the fashion business; presumably an industry commentator noted a spike in the “deep vee” showing up on the catwalks or red carpets and, things “on trend” needing a tag, conjured up (or re-purposed) “veagage”.  The speculative link to the look becoming more prevalent because GLP-1s have rendered more women with physiques suitable for such things is intriguing but wholly impressionistic and trends anyway tend to wax and wane although, in its niche, veagage seems here to stay.

Of Cleavage

Actor Sydney Sweeney (b 1997) with a more traditional implementation of the V-neckline.  Empirically, this look is likely to remain the dominant approach although, as it has for years, the veavege will run in parallel. 

The noun cleavage seems first to have appeared in the 1805, the construct being cleave + -age.  It was used first in geology and mineralogy to describe “the tendency (of rocks or gems) to break cleanly along natural fissures” with the generalized meaning “action or state of cleaving or being cleft” emerging in the mid 1860s.  Although the artistic record confirms the popularity of the look had over the centuries come and gone in the cyclical way fashion behaves, use of “cleavage” in the sense of the “the hollow between a woman's breasts (usually when artificially supported), especially as exposed by a low-cut garment” appears not to have been seen in print prior to the use in an article in Time magazine discussing the (nominally) self-censorship codes of practice adopted (not entirely willingly) by the Hollywood film studios.  In finding a single word, Time’s editors proved good practitioners of journalistic succinctness because what they were reducing to a word had been described in the industry’s bureaucratese as “the shadowed depression dividing an actress' bosom into two distinct sections.”  Cleavage caught on although to this day the more up-market fashion glossies still hanker after the French décolletage.

Variations on a theme of Vee: Lindsay Lohan (during blonde phase) in V-neckline, V Magazine's Black and White Ball, Standard Hotel, New York City, September 2011.

Cleave was in use prior to 950 and was from the Middle English cleven, from the Old English strong verb clēofan (to split, to separate), from the Proto-West Germanic kleuban, from the Proto-Germanic kleubaną, from the primitive Indo-European glewb- (to cut, to slice).  It was a doublet of clive and cognate with the Dutch klieven, the dialectal German klieben, the Swedish klyva, the Norwegian Nynorsk kløyva; it was akin to the Ancient Greek γλύφω (glúphō) (carve) and the Classical Latin glūbere (to peel).  Given the time and place of cleave’s emergence, etymologists suspect the original sense was likely related to the handling of timber (ie to split or divide by or as if by a cutting blow, especially along a natural line of division, as the grain of wood).  The suffix -age was from the Middle English -age, from the Old French -age, from the Latin -āticum.  Cognates include the French -age, the Italian -aggio, the Portuguese -agem, the Spanish -aje & Romanian -aj.  It was used to form nouns (1) with the sense of collection or appurtenance, (2) indicating a process, action, or a result, (3) of a state or relationship, (4) indicating a place, (5) indicating a charge, toll, or fee, (6) indicating a rate & (7) of a unit of measure.  The French suffix -age was from the Middle & Old French -age, from the Latin -āticum, (greatly) extended from words like rivage and voyage.  It was used usually to form nouns with the sense of (1) "action or result of Xing" or (more rarely), "action related to X" or (2) "state of being (a or an) X".  A less common use was the formation of collective nouns.  Historically, there were many applications (family relationships, locations et al) but use has long tended to be restricted to the sense of "action of Xing".  Many older terms now have little to no connection with their most common modern uses, something particularly notable of those descended from actual Latin words (fromage, voyage et al).

Bella Hadid (b 1996, right), Cannes Film Festival, 2021.

A veavage can of course be an eye-catching billboard and the obvious stuff to advertise is jewellery (left).  Model Bella Hadid showed how it could be done with scalloped neckline, wearing a black Schiaparelli gown (cut for the purpose with an untypically wide aperture) used to frame a sculptural piece, fashioned in gilded brass to resemble an anatomical cast of the lungs’ bronchi (the paired series of cartilaginous, tube-like airways branching from the trachea into each lung, acting as the primary passage for air distribution).  However, in while in commerce a handy advertising space, those adopting a veavage seem most inclined to restrict adornments to earrings or other accessories which don't interrupt the line of skin between neck and waist, the trick being to achieve a “lengthening effect”  

Golfer and multi-media personality Paige Spiranac (b 1993).

Despite the etymological implication, a veagage is about the display of skin and is not dependent on being framed in a “V” but the point about it is the de-emphasis of the breasts (and thus the cleavage).  What Paige Spiranac wore to Sports Illustrated 60^th anniversary event could (with some strategically placed double-sided tape) be used for the purpose but technically the ensemble was a variant of the “curtain reveal” motif (in “open” mode).  Whether it would produce a veagage or a cleavage would depend on the wearer.

In the 1980s, US political scientists used the term “cross-cutting cleavages” to describe what had been revealed as a phenomenon both increasing frequency and spreading demographically and geographically.  The term referred to a social structure in which different lines of division in society intersect rather than coincide (ie groups created by one social division are mixed across the groups created by another division, instead of aligning with them).  In the West, as an identifiable trend, this likely was something that had ebbed and flowed since the decline of feudalism but in the post-war years it became of interest to political scientists because it was clearly something influencing social conflict and voting behaviour, the issue-by-issue alignment within and between sectional classifications no longer as predictable.  What had become obvious was the membership of groups in one dimension was overlapping with multiple groups in another.

Influencer Sophadophaa (she stresses : “It’s Sophia not Sophie”) in red gown with plunging vee.

Because the veagage effect is most effective when at its most 2D (two dimentional), when that’s what’s wanted, the usual approach is to have the fabric cling to the skin (with double-sided tape as required) but V-necklines can be executed differently for other outcomes; the double-sided tape is still applied but in different places.

Overlap was not new in that “coalitions of interest or concern” had long been known to be subject to these “crossovers” (especially at the margins) but in the days before big machine databases transformed this into something political parties could not merely manage but exploit, it was a genuine problem.  The more optimistic academics suggested cross-cutting cleavages operated to stabilize democracy because, with individuals simultaneously belonging to many groups (class, religion, occupation, region), the overlap prevented politics from collapsing into a series of polarized conflicts, what some called “the Balkanization of society”.  The argument was the behaviour compelled political parties to build broad coalitions across multiple groups, moderating the inherent tendency to conflict and reducing the likelihood of groups becoming the captives of extremist positions.  There may have been something in this because in the US, between the 1930s & 1980s it was those broad (notably geographical) coalitions which characterized US politics; political conflict didn’t go away but it was diffuse rather than binary.  In operation, that mid-century model was very different from Europe.  There, “cleavage theory” was a descriptive model of the way several centuries of major (and often bloody) social conflicts (cleavages) worked finally as the catalyst for state formation and industrialization.

Wonderbra New Deep Plunge Bra.

The manufacturers have for decades noted the appeal of the V-neckline and have created a vibrant market in accessories and devices.  Up to a point, the conventional cantilever method works but there are practical limits.  However, while physics can’t be fooled, optics can and what Wonderbra did for the New Deep Plunge Bra was replace the conventional fabric-covered gore with one of translucent plastic, thus creating a “one skin tone fits all” fitting.  Except on close inspection, it was close to invisible.

The West (and especially the US) is of course now in the age of “mega identity politics” and the parameters of those identities are in the effective control of a relative handful of extremists (“absolutists” or “purists” the more polite forms) who have the historically unique (in reach, immediacy and scope) platform of social media set agendas and cancel transgressors; even in groups originally created because of oppression, now routinely oppress heretics who depart from the orthodoxy.  This does not imply political parties have become “single issue” operations but substantially they are tending towards the ideologically monolithic as aggregations of what scholars have labelled “stacked identities” and the process of “purification” is not organic: within the party machines, those seeking absolute control undertaking purges, witness the gradual preponderance within the Republican Party of the MAGA (Make America Great Again) over those condemned as “pseudo conservatives”, the RINOs (Republicans in Name Only).  In the Democratic Party, identities have come to trump (the verb) all else and few now dare to raise the matter of trans-females competing in sporting competitions for women because the “trans rights” have become a litmus-paper test of adherence to orthodoxy.  So, the machinery which decades ago assembled coalitions of interest now creates tribes with much of what that word implies, political scientists sanitizing things a bit with the tag “affective polarization”.  While the cause-and-effect processes in all this were not wholly binary, it has rendered conflict now identity-based in that conflicts are between world views and way of life rather than the minutiae of policies.

Ultradeep U-Plunge.  Where the vee didn't plunge so deep, a more conventional construction could be used although many did include "clear" shoulder straps, made of the same kind of material as sometimes used for the gore.

So, whereas the national and state legislatures once thrashed things out and often managed to achieve compromises, that’s now less common because a “compromise” is seen as a “surrender” or “betrayal” and the consequences for that included being “cancelled” or “primaried”, two weaponized devices able successfully to be deployed by a remarkably small number of committed extremists.  None of this is any secret but there’s no obvious solution because the simple fix (mass active participation of the electorate (the so-called “sensible centre”) in party politics) has little appeal for either the voters or those running the party machines, both groups for their own reasons appalled by the notion.  The days are gone when the Republicans had their “moderate” faction (the so-called Rockefeller Republicans (named after Nelson Rockefeller (1908–1979; US vice president 1974-1977 and who earned immortality by having “died on the job”) and the Democrats their “Southern Conservatives” (the so-called “Dixiecrats” in the not always attractive tradition of figures like old Strom Thurmond (1902-2003; senator for South Carolina 1954-2003)).  By the 2020s, that overlap has almost completely disappeared with politics now more polarized than at any time in living memory and political scientists lament the shift but they should recall a remark in the paper Toward a More Responsible Two‑Party System (1950), published by the APSA (American Political Science Association): “The two parties do not differ enough.”  Expanding on that, the authors added: “Alternatives between the parties are defined so badly that it is often difficult to determine what the election has decided even in broadest terms.”  As a critique this came to be called the “Tweedledum & Tweedledee problem” (two characters in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871) by Lewis Carroll (pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832–1898)) who had different names but look the same and behave in identical ways.

Das U-boob Theorie.

Orla U-Plunge Backless Adhesive Bra in Black (left) and Salma Hayek (b 1966, right) demonstrates the uvage, Evening Standard Theatre Awards, London, November 2015.  Orla's “adhesive” is a reference to the side panels which adhere directly to the skin (using the same technology as surgical tape), allowing the bra to a achieve a “backless” effect.  Because the cut of some gowns obviously is a “U” rather than a “V”, the fashionistas might feel compelled to add “uvage” (pronounced yoo-vig, the construct being u + (clea)vage)) to the lexicon because, if the two styles appear together on the catwalk, single-word differentiation might be helpful.

Heart & wedge: Luciana Heart Cut Out Long Sleeve Mini Dress in black (left) and French content creator & author Léna Situations (Léna Mahfouf, b 1997), in Georges Hobeika (b 1962) black gown with inverted V-neckline (technically a wedge), Academy Awards ceremony, Los Angeles, March 2026.  Ms Mahfouf uses “Léna Situations” as an online pseudonym because that was the name of the fashion & lifestyle-focused blog she, as a teen-ager, created in 2012; it gained her a “brand identity” and was thus for some purposes retained in adulthood.  The blog would have seemed familiar to the members of the long defunct Situationist International because her concept was sharing fragments of her life in different “situations” which might be defined by the place, the outfit worn or what was being experienced so was thus a series of spectacles, able to be understood as individual relics of time & place or a series of narratives.  Using that model, platforms like Instagram have allowed just about everybody to become a situationist and while the original situationists would have recognized “social lives mediated by images, media & commodities”, they'd not have approved.

However, although tempting, being too specific about geometry might lead to a proliferation of terms because designers have proved inventive when shaping “cut-outs” in gowns.  A heart shape could perhaps attract “cardivage” (pronounced kar-dee-vig, the construct being cardi(ac) + (clea)vage) and an inverted vee could be called a “wedgeage” (pronounced wed-jige, the construct being wedge + (cleav)age).  In formal logic, the wedge symbol (∧) represents “AND” (the logical conjunction); in its opposite orientation (V) the symbol is called a “vee” and represents logical “OR”.  So, imposing precision may be a needless solution to a non-existent problem and the industry seems likely to continue to tolerate what Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) in 1906 called “terminological inexactitude” (used as a euphemism for the un-parliamentary “lie” and coined because in the House of Commons, Mr Speaker had long since proscribed use of  “mendacious”).  Beyond the "V", "U", "heart" and "wedge", there are more shapes so veavage seems likely to serve as a generic for all.

Charli XCX (stage-name of English singer-songwriter Charlotte Emma Aitchison (b 1992)) in a Christopher John Rogers (b 1993) white fit & flare dress with ruffled peplum, featuring a more conventional implementation of the V-neckline.

Ms Mahfouf's retention of a youthful online pseudonym is not unique, Charli XCX another example.  The star herself revealed the stage name is pronounced chahr-lee ex-cee-ex; it has no connection with Roman numerals and XCX is anyway not a standard Roman number.  XC is “90” (C minus X (100-10)) and CX is “110” (C plus X (100 +10)) but, should the need arise, XCX could be used as a code for “100”, on the model of something like the “May 35th” reference Chinese internet users, when speaking of the “Tiananmen Square Incident” of 4 June 1989, adopted in an attempt to circumvent the CCP's (Chinese Communist Party) “Great Firewall of China” censorship apparatus.  In 2015, Ms XCX revealed the text string was an element in her MSN screen name (CharliXCX92) when young (it stood for “kiss Charli kiss”) and, after appearing in the early publicity for her music, it gained critical mass so Charli XCX we still have.

In 1950, the political scientists had concluded there was “too great a degree of internal heterogeneity” in that, housing both liberal and conservative wings, the forces tended to “cancel each other out” with the consequence being party programmes which were vague and often similar, meaning voters found it hard to identify clear policy alternatives.  In a sense, that took the “science” out of “political science” and the academics didn’t like it, preferring clear battle-lines (Roundheads vs Cavaliers; democracy vs fascism and such) for without clear differences, there really was no politics; all that remained was the dreary business of management.  In retrospect, the APSA likely agrees people should be careful what they wish for and and many contemporary political scientists now argue the system has moved too far in the opposite direction, producing intense polarization and reinforcing cleavages.  Still, we may as well get used to the system because, with cleavages widening and edges hardening, most conclude it’ll likely get worse before it gets better.

Of Vee Engines

Ford FE V8 (left) and Y-Block (right). The frontal view of the FE engine illustrates both why the configuration is called a “vee” and why it would have been understandable had the 90^o engines been dubbed “L8s”.  Ford’s first OHV (overhead valve) V8 (for pick-up trucks & passenger vehicles) picked up the nickname “Y-Block” because the skirt extended to an unusually low point, the additional cast iron thus recalling the tail of the letter “Y”.

The “V” in certain engines (V4, V8, V16 etc) is a reference to the angle of the banks of the block’s cylinder banks when viewed along the line of the crankshaft and the configuration in ICE (internal combustion engines) was used within half-a-decade of the “first” automobile appearing on the roads in 1886, Wilhelm Maybach (1846-1929) and Gottlieb Daimler (1834-1900) in 1889 installing a 565 cm³ (34 cubic inch) V-twin (ie two cylinder) unit in the Daimler Stahlradwagen (steel-wheeled car).  The Stahlradwagen’s V-twin used what was, by the standards of which would follow, a very narrow angle for the vee (quoted usually a 17^o but listed also “in the 20^o class”) and over the years, “vee” engines have appeared with angles ranging between 12.5 and 180^o (while the latter may seem a contradiction in terms, the 180^o vee (e a straight line) is accepted engineering jargon).  The first V8 (1903) & V12 (1904) appeared in what was for each the “ideal vee angle” (90 & 60^o respectively), the number dictated by desire for the even firing intervals to ensure the smoothest power delivery and those pioneers set the template which has tended since to be followed although there have been many exceptions.  Of course, a V8 in a 90^o configuration really should be a “L8” but because the Maybach & Daimler V-twin had established the terminological model, regardless of the angle, such things have always been “V-something”.  

Ferrparts schematic of crankcase parts for the 365 GT4 BB's 4.4 litre (270 cubic inch) flat-12.  According to engineers, this is a "flattened vee".

That’s fine because, conceptually, there’s always a vertex but according to Ferrari, the “Flat 12” engine fitted the various iterations of the Berlinetta Boxer (1973-1974) was also a type of “vee”, despite the two banks of six being horizontally opposed (ie at 180^o); they called it a “flattened vee” which, as Euclid would have told them, there being no vertex, that means they’re describing a “straight-line segment”.  The engineers would have acknowledged the wisdom of the geometers but argued the use was an established convention in engineering to distinguish the two types of “flat” engines (those with pistons which move in and out simultaneously (on the model of a boxer’s gloves) being “boxers” and those in which the pistons move in unison being “flattened vees” or “180^o vees”.  The Ferrari website explains all this while variously and cheerfully calling the engine a “flat 12”, “boxer-type” or “180^o V12”; so, take your pick.  It’s on that site the factory acknowledged the true story about how the original 365 GT4 BB (1973) picked up the “BB” designation and why “Berlinetta Boxer” was concocted as a cover story.

1930 Cadillac V16 452.

At one end of the spectrum, Lancia produced a range of what they described as “narrow-angle” small-displacement V4s and that was apt because the vee was set at 12.5^o, the compactness of the jewel-like power-plant permitting outstanding packaging efficiency.  Less obviously efficient was Cadillac which, for a brief, shining moment, made a 452 cubic inch (7.4 litre) V16 with the two banks eight arrayed in a 45^o vee; that made it a photogenic piece of machinery but it had the misfortune of being introduced in 1930, right at the onset of the Great Depression and although an encouraging 2,500 left the line in the first year of production, demand collapsed and it was only for reasons of prestige GM (General Motors) kept it in the catalogue.  By the time it was withdrawn from sale in 1938, not even a further 1400 had been ordered.  It was in that year replaced by a technically less intriguing 431 cubic inch (7.1 litre) V16 which, built with a 135^o vee, was even less successful, a reported 516 engines leaving the plant although it’s believed only 499 were installed in rolling chassis.  Also with a  vee was the most charismatic V16 of all, the BRM V16 (1947-1955) which was one of those “glorious failures” at which the British are so adept but no grand prix car since has sounded so good.

Factory cutaway diagram of Daimler-Benz DB 605 Inverted V12 as fitted to Messerschmitt Bf-109.

The DB 60X series was literally “an upside-down V12” but it was regarded thus only because the convention had been to mount them in the still familiar aspect.  Equipped with a dry-sump and direct fuel-injection, the angle assumed in flight made little difference to the engine, unlike the early Allied aero-engines which were carburetor-fed.  In combat, that was a great advantage for the German pilots who were fortunate the British didn't accept a spy's offer to supply them with a stolen example of the vital DB fuel pump.  As it was, the RAF (Royal Air Force) had to wait until Bendex developed a "pressurized carburetor" (a type of throttle-body fuel-injection) although the stop-gap "fix" which proved a remarkably effective partial amelioration was "Miss Shilling's orifice".   

In the first half of the twentieth century, the V12 engine held great appeal for the designers of military aircraft because the layout solved several critical aerodynamic and mechanical problems which would have remained insurmountable (and probably exacerbated) had the traditional in-line engines been further extended or enlargedused.  More cylinders meant more power and this the V12s achieved without the excessive length (and thus the dreaded “crankshaft flex”) which would have been suffered by an in-line 12.  The virtues the designers sought were (1) robustness, (2) lightness, (3) power and (4) compactness, the quest always for a better power-to-weight ratio and for this the V12 proved the “sweet-spot”.  The British industry in the inter-war years developed many V12 aero-engines (notably the Rolls-Royce Merlin which became famous by powering all the early Supermarine Spitfires) but because the Germans didn’t return to military aviation until the mid-1930s, they had the advantage of working on a “clean sheet of paper”, one of their many innovations being the “inverted V12”, the most numerous the Daimler-Benz DB 600 series.  In these, the crankshaft was above the cylinders so the cylinder banks pointed downward and this offered several advantages including (1) improved pilot visibility, (2) greater propeller ground clearance (meaning also the larger propellers became possible without needing longer landing gear), (3) easier access to accessories (fuel pumps, magnetos and such at atop, meaning mechanics could fix or replace components more quickly), (4) the fitting of a Motorkanone (a cannon firing through the propeller hub) became viable (5) shorter exhaust stacks and (5) the plumbing for the advanced MFI (mechanical fuel injection) system was both simplified and made more accessible.

Exhaust stubs of left-hand bank of a BRM V16.

Like the DB inverted V12s, some of the BRM V16 had low-mounted exhaust stubs but whether the flow of the gasses had any effect on aerodynamics was never studied although, the breathing must have been efficient because the 1.5 litre (91 cubic inch) V16 could at 12,000 rpm generate up to 600 HP.  At full cry it produced the most glorious sound ever heard in Formula One but unfortunately it was at the threshold of pain for those standing close so the system was revised to use a pair of long "dump pipes".

Almost as a footnote, the German designers noted they were able also to exploit the location of the stubs to gain unanticipated benefits from the path of the inverted V12’s exhaust thrust and cowling flow.  It’s overstating things to call it a “jet thrust” effect but that’s how it can be visualized, high-velocity exhaust gases exiting the stacks producing a small rearward thrust component and the engineers experimented to find the optimum length and angle, calculating the “effective thrust” at between 50–150 lb (220–670 N) depending on the power setting and throttle used.  In real-world conditions, this translated into perhaps an additional 25-odd horsepower which may not sound significant in engines generating over a thousand but in combat, it could be the difference between life and death.  Additionally, the aeronautical engineers used an aspect of fluid dynamics to improve the “boundary-layer management” along the cowling (ie using the hot, high-energy exhaust stream flowing along the sides of the cowling to “energize” the boundary layer of air "attached" to the fuselage surface).  What this did was slightly delay any flow separation, reducing “draw” and providing a better flow over the wing’s critical root area.  The differences were slight and subtle but again, in combat happening at altitude, at hundred of mph, inches and seconds matter so it could be the difference between life and death.