A pedestal (from French piédestal, Italian piedistallo 'foot of a stall') or plinth is the support of a statue or a vase, and of a column in architecture. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In civil engineering, it is also called basement.. It transmits loads from superstructure to the substructure and acts as the retaining wall for the filling inside the plinth or raised floor. An elevated pedestal or plinth which bears a statue and which is raised from the substructure supporting it is sometimes called an acropodium.