Of the Roman Ionic Order, as a whole, we know very little, there being only three accredited examples of it, viz. the Theatre of Marcellus, the Temple of Fortuna Virilis, and the Temple of Concord. Of the first of these, the capital is the simplest and plainest, and also the smallest in its proportions; that of the second is by very far the best, its volutes retaining most of the Greek character; and that of the third is remarkable, if not for its ugliness in other respects, for its volutes being turned outwards diagonally, so as to present four equal faces,—a mode afterwards _re-invented_ and brought up as a novelty by Scamozzi, in honour of whom it has since been distinguished by the name of the Scamozzi capital. But if there are few ancient buildings remaining of the Roman Ionic Order, there are numerous detached specimens of it in antique columns that have been preserved by having been made use of in other buildings, or deposited in collections of sculpture. Many of these have been delineated and published by Piranesi and others; and they are so numerous and so varied that we cannot pretend either to classify them, or to particularize even the principal ones. All that we can here say is, that although they fall far short of the refined taste exhibited in Greek examples, some of them possess considerable merit, and supply ideas for other and better varieties. They also serve to convince us that, like the Greeks, the Romans did not abide by a single stereotype pattern for each Order: the attempt to establish such uniformity and conformity to rule was reserved for the Palladios and Vignolas of the 16th century.