CELLA

cella, in architecture, the latin name for the sanctuary of a roman temple, corresponding with the naos of the greek temple. in the etruscan temples, according to vitruvius, there were three cellas, side by side; and in the temple of venus built by hadrian at rome there were two cellas, both enclosed, however, in a single peristyle. cellaret (i.e. little cellar), strictly that portion of a sideboard which is used for holding bottles and decanters, so called from a cellar (which in general may be any underground unlighted apartment) being commonly used for keeping wine. sometimes it is a drawer, divided into compartments lined with zinc, and sometimes a cupboard, but still an integral part of the sideboard. in the latter part of the 18th century, when the sideboard was in process of evolution from a side-table with drawers into the large and important piece of furniture which it eventually became, the cellaret was a detached receptacle. it was most commonly of mahogany or rosewood, many-sided or even octagonal, and occasionally oval, bound with broad bands of brass and lined with zinc partitions to hold the ice for cooling wine. sometimes a tap was fixed in the lower part for drawing off the water from the melted ice. cellarets were usually placed under the sideboard, and were, as a rule, handsome and well-proportioned; but as the artistic impulse which created the great 18th-century english school of furniture died away, their form grew debased, and under the influence of the english empire fashion, which drew its inspiration from a bastard classicism, they assumed the shape of sarcophagi incongruously mounted with lions' heads and claw-feet. hepplewhite called them "gardes du vin"; they are now nearly always known as "wine-coolers."