The French, who till of late never adopted the ornaments of the ancients, and jealous as all mankind are of the reputation of their national taste, have blended together those ornaments with the vague and fantastical appellation of arabesque, a style which, though entirely distinct from the grotesque, has notwithstanding been most absurdly and universally confounded with it by the ignorant.

Works in Architecture, Vol. 1 (1778)