‖ tholos Arch.
(ˈθɒlɒs)
Pl. tholoi (-ɔɪ). Also in Latin form (esp. in sense 1) tholus (ˈθəʊləs), pl. tholi (-aɪ).
[L. tholus, Gr. θόλος, a round building with a conical or vaulted roof.]
a. A circular domed building or structure; a dome, cupola; a lantern.
| 1644 Evelyn Diary 7 Nov., A pretty odd fabriq, with a Tribunal, or Tholus within. a 1668 R. Lassels Voy. Italy (1698) I. 188 On the top of it [the Domo of Florence] stands mounted a fair Cupola (or Tholus). 1730–6 Bailey (folio), Tholus, the Roof of a Temple or Church, the Centre, Scutcheon, or Knot in the middle of an arched Roof, the Lanthorn or Cupola of a publick Hall. 1832 Gell Pompeiana I. iv. 47 A circular or polygonal tholos. 1841 Civil Eng. & Arch. Jrnl. IV. 117/2 The tholus, or concave dome. |
b. Gr. Antiq. An excavated circular tomb of the Mycenæan age, domed and lined with masonry. Also
tholos-tomb.
| 1885 Athenæum 12 Dec. 773/2 Mr. Pullan..was astonished to find that the lower cell of the so-called prison of St. Peter at Rome was part of a tholus. 1896 Tholoi [see dromos]. 1910 Edin. Rev. Apr. 479 Among the forms sepulchre are the great bee-hive tholos [etc.]. 1957 [see beehive tomb s.v. beehive 3]. 1975 Times Lit. Suppl. 14 Mar. 282/1 The megalithic architecture of Britain..had no conceivable ancestry in the Mycenaean tholoi. |
| attrib. 1902 R. C. Bosanquet in Ann. Brit. Sch. at Athens VIII. 305 Tholos-burial was introduced in eastern Crete towards the close of the Minoan Age. 1921 Discovery Feb. 33/1 The principle of the tholos-tomb was most in use in Mycenæan times. 1983 Times 10 Feb. 1/3 The underground tholos tomb, shaped like a giant beehive, lies in a fifteenth-century BC cemetery..three miles south of Argos. |