Dome on the State Capitol building in Harrisburg Pennsylvania

A tholobate (), also called a drum or tambour, is the upright part of a building on which a

dome A dome () is an architectural element similar to the hollow upper half of a sphere. There is significant overlap with the term cupola, which may also refer to a dome or a structure on top of a dome. The precise definition of a dome has been a m ...

is raised. It is generally in the shape of a

cylinder A cylinder () has traditionally been a three-dimensional solid, one of the most basic of curvilinear geometric shapes. In elementary geometry, it is considered a prism with a circle as its base. A cylinder may also be defined as an infinite ...

or a

polygon In geometry, a polygon () is a plane figure made up of line segments connected to form a closed polygonal chain. The segments of a closed polygonal chain are called its '' edges'' or ''sides''. The points where two edges meet are the polygon ...

prism PRISM is a code name for a program under which the United States National Security Agency (NSA) collects internet communications from various U.S. internet companies. The program is also known by the SIGAD . PRISM collects stored internet ...

. The name derives from the tholos, the Greek term for a round building with a roof and a circular wall. Another architectural meaning of ''drum'' is a circular section of a

column A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column is a compression member ...

shaft.

Examples

In the earlier

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and construction, constructi ...

the dome rested directly on the

pendentive In architecture, a pendentive is a constructional device permitting the placing of a circular dome over a square room or of an elliptical dome over a rectangular room. The pendentives, which are triangular segments of a sphere, taper to point ...

s and the windows were pierced in the dome itself; in later examples, between the pendentive and the dome an intervening circular wall was built in which the windows were pierced. This is the type which was universally employed by the architects of the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

, of whose works the best-known example is

St. Peter's Basilica The Papal Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican (), or simply St. Peter's Basilica (; ), is a church of the Italian High Renaissance located in Vatican City, an independent microstate enclaved within the city of Rome, Italy. It was initiall ...

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

. Other examples of churches of this type are

St Paul's Cathedral St Paul's Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of St Paul the Apostle, is an Anglican cathedral in London, England, the seat of the Bishop of London. The cathedral serves as the mother church of the Diocese of London in the Church of Engl ...

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and the churches of the

Les Invalides The Hôtel des Invalides (; ), commonly called (; ), is a complex of buildings in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France, containing museums and monuments, all relating to the military history of France, as well as a hospital and an old soldi ...

, the Val-de-Grâce, and the Sorbonne in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. There are also secular buildings with tholobates: the

United States Capitol dome The United States Capitol features a dome situated above its rotunda. The dome is in height and in diameter. Designed by Thomas U. Walter, the fourth Architect of the Capitol, it was constructed between 1855 and 1866 at a cost of $1,047,291 ...

in Washington, D.C. is set on a drum, a feature imitated in numerous American state capitols. The

Panthéon The Panthéon (, ), is a monument in the 5th arrondissement of Paris, France. It stands in the Latin Quarter, Paris, Latin Quarter (Quartier latin), atop the , in the centre of the , which was named after it. The edifice was built between 1758 ...

in Paris is another secular building featuring a dome on a drum. St Paul's Cathedral and the Panthéon were the two inspirations for the U.S. Capitol. In contrast, the dome of the

Reichstag building The Reichstag (; ) is a historic legislative government building on Platz der Republik in Berlin that is the seat of the German Bundestag. It is also the meeting place of the Federal Convention, which elects the President of Germany. The Ne ...

in Berlin before its post-war restoration was a

quadrilateral In Euclidean geometry, geometry a quadrilateral is a four-sided polygon, having four Edge (geometry), edges (sides) and four Vertex (geometry), corners (vertices). The word is derived from the Latin words ''quadri'', a variant of four, and ''l ...

, so its tholobate was square and not round.

Gallery

Reichstag-1870.jpg, The Reichstag in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

ca. 1894, with a square tholobate Kingston City Hall in 2007.jpg, Tholobate atop Kingston City Hall in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

Harichavank-Harich1 - Copy.JPG, Tholobate on Harichavank Monastery in

Armenia Armenia, officially the Republic of Armenia, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of West Asia. It is a part of the Caucasus region and is bordered by Turkey to the west, Georgia (country), Georgia to the north and Azerbaijan to ...

File:L1370487.jpg, A row of Greek column drums (unfinished), at the Temple of Apollo, Didyma

References

{{reflist Architectural elements

Examples

Gallery

See also

References