dado

1. (architecture) The section of a pedestal above the base.

2. (architecture) The lower portion of an interior wall decorated differently from the upper portion.Examples: "Like a dado round the room was the jutting line of splendid heavy game-heads, the best of their sort from every quarter of the world, with the rare white rhinoceros of the Lado Enclave drooping its supercilious lip above them all."; "Hangings of tapestry were behind the high seats, worked with flowers, snake’s-head, snapdragon, dragon-mouth, and their kind; and on the dado below the windows were sculptures of birds and beasts and creeping things."

3. (carpentry) The rectangular channel in a board cut across the grain.