Tholos (architecture)
A tholos (pl.: tholoi; from Ancient Greek θόλος, meaning "conical roof"[1] or "dome"), in Latin tholus (pl.: tholi), is a form of building that was widely used in the classical world. It is a round structure with a circular wall and a roof, usually built upon a couple of steps (a podium), and often with a ring of columns supporting a conical or domed roof.
For other uses, see Tholos.
It differs from a monopteros (Ancient Greek:ὁ μονόπτερος from the Polytonic: μόνος, only, single, alone, and τὸ πτερόν, wing), a circular colonnade supporting a roof but without any walls, which therefore does not have a cella (room inside).[2] Both these types are sometimes called rotundas.
An increasingly large series of round buildings were constructed in the developing tradition of classical architecture until Late antiquity, which are covered here. Medieval round buildings are covered at rotunda. From the Renaissance onwards the classical tholos form had an enduring revival, now often topped by a dome, especially as an element in much larger buildings.
The tholos is not to be confused with the beehive tomb, or "tholos tomb" in modern terminology, a distinct form in Late Bronze Age Greece and other areas.[3] But many other round tombs and mausolea were built, especially for Roman emperors.
![Another reconstruction of the Tholos of Epidauros[20]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4f/Reconstruction_of_section_of_tholos_of_Epidaurus._Wellcome_L0011572.jpg/170px-Reconstruction_of_section_of_tholos_of_Epidaurus._Wellcome_L0011572.jpg)
Foundation of the Arsinoeum at Samothrace, with the dedication slab at front
Arlington Reservoir, Massachusetts, a 2,000,000 gallon water tower based on the Arsinoeum at Samothrace
Panthéon in Paris
The tholos was revived in one of the most influential buildings in Renaissance architecture, the Tempietto in a courtyard of the church of San Pietro in Montorio in Rome. This was designed by Donato Bramante around 1502. It is a small building whose innovation, as far as Western Europe was concerned, was to use the tholos form as the base for a dome above; this may have reflected a Byzantine structure in Jerusalem over the tomb of Christ. The Roman Temple of Vesta (which has no dome) was probably also an influence. This pairing of tholos, now called a "drum" or "tholobate", and dome became extremely popular raised high above main structures which were often based on the Roman temple.[42]
Most of the proposals for rebuilding St. Peter's Basilica, the first by Bramante in 1506, included this combination of elements, at least on the exterior; as at St Peter's, false domes often gave a different interior view. The pairing of drum and dome was initially mostly used for churches, as at Les Invalides in Paris (1676) and St Paul's Cathedral in London (1697), but later other buildings, and continued until the 20th century at least.[43] The US Capitol is one of a number of buildings where a tholos is above the dome, serving as a base for the Statue of Freedom, as well as two much larger colonnaded ones below; versions of the formula have also been used in several (arguably most) American state capitols. The Panthéon in Paris is also topped by a tholos below a dome.[44]
The Radcliffe Camera, built as a library for Oxford University in 1737, is one of relatively few large buildings after the Renaissance to use a purely circular plan, with little emphasis on the entrance, in a classical style that is full of complexities and looks back to Italian Mannerist architecture.[45] The Mausoleum in the park at Castle Howard in North Yorkshire, by Nicholas Hawksmoor (completed 1742), gives a "tragic" interpretation of the theme by making the columns large and close together and the dome low.[46]
Most preferred the Pantheon-style rotunda, with a pronounced temple front, or often several. The famous Villa La Rotonda (or "Villa Capra") by Andrea Palladio (begun 1567) took the Pantheon theme, but adding a columnaded temple front on four sides, to make a sort of Greek cross. There is a high and circular central hall with a large domed roof, but the building behind the porticos is actually square. This formula was often copied for country houses, as at Chiswick House (1725), designed by its owner Lord Burlington, and Mereworth Castle (1723) by Colen Campbell.[47]
The Rotunda at the University of Virginia, designed by Thomas Jefferson (1826) was much closer to the Pantheon, which was acknowledged as its model, and the tradition was still in use in the 1930s, when Manchester Central Library was designed and built by Vincent Harris, who often used an updated classical style. At its opening, one critic wrote, "This is the sort of thing which persuades one to believe in the perennial applicability of the Classical canon."[48]
