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When the crowning moulding of an entablature is of the cyma form, it is called a “cymatium.”

In Greek and Roman temples the cymatium of the cornice was the gutter, and the water was discharged through the mouths of lions, whose heads were carved on the same.

This head, is worked from a block which forms the springing stone of both the cymatium and the corona of the pediment.

In Greek temples the water from the roof passed through the mouths of lions whose heads were carved or modelled in the marble or terra-cotta cymatium of the cornice.

It forms the crowning feature of the Egyptian temples, and took the place of the cymatium in many of the Etruscan temples.