Virginia Architecture in the Seventeenth Century

Virginia Architecture in the Seventeenth Century is by Henry Chandlee Forman. The introduction says the fine art of architecture flourished in the land that today comprises the Commonwealth of Virginia three centuries ago, and says there is so very little left compared to what formerly existed. The text says that in the Old Dominion, Indian towns were small, usually covering about an acre of ground and containing ten or twelve buildings, seldom more than thirty. The text says the towns themselves may be grouped into three kinds: open, fortified, and partially fortified.

The text says the palisades built by the Indians in Virginia usually were tree trunks or heavy timbers, from five inches to eight in diameter. A house captioned Medieval One-Bay House (c. 1670) is described as twenty-and-a-half feet long and sixteen wide without its tremendous pyramid chimney, with the chimney end wholly brick and the other three sides clapboarded.