Pedestal

A pedestal (from French piédestal, from Italian piedistallo 'foot of a stall') or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars.

It transmits loads from superstructure to the substructure and acts as the retaining wall for the filling inside the plinth or raised floor.

[1] An elevated pedestal or plinth that bears a statue, and which is raised from the substructure supporting it (typically roofs or corniches), is sometimes called an acropodium.

The architects of the Italian Renaissance, however, conceived the idea that no order was complete without a pedestal, and as the orders were by them employed to divide up and decorate a building in several stories, the cornice of the pedestal was carried through and formed the sills of their windows, or, in open arcades, round a court, the balustrade of the arcade.

In imperial China, a stone tortoise called bixi was traditionally used as the pedestal for important stele, especially those associated with emperors.