Faber
（
τέκτων). The name given indiscriminately to any artisan or
mechanic who works in hard materials, such as wood, stone, metal, etc., in contradistinction
to one who moulds or models in soft substances, like wax or clay, who received the appellation
of
plastes. It is, consequently, accompanied in most cases by a
descriptive epithet which determines the calling of the workman alluded to; as
faber tignarius, a carpenter;
faber ferrarius, a blacksmith;
faber aeris or
aerarius, marmoris, eboris, a worker in
bronze, marble, and ivory; and so on. The Greek term has not quite so extensive a meaning as
the Latin one, being rarely applied to a worker in metal, who was expressly called
χαλκεύς or
σιδηρεύς, though some
passages occur where it is so used. The accompanying illustration represents a carpenter's
shop,
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Carpenter's Shop. (From a painting found at Herculaneum.)
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from a painting found at Herculaneum, in which the workmen are represented
under the form of genii, according to the conventional treatment of the ancient schools, for
subjects of this nature, in which scenes of ordinary life are depicted. The fabri attached to
the army were under the command of a special officer (
praefectus
fabrorum) (
B. C. i. 24).
