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 ...

, a semi-dome (or half-dome) is a half

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 ...

that covers a semi-circular area in a

building A building or edifice is an enclosed Structure#Load-bearing, structure with a roof, walls and window, windows, usually standing permanently in one place, such as a house or factory. Buildings come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and functions, a ...

Architecture

Semi-domes are a common feature of

apse In architecture, an apse (: apses; from Latin , 'arch, vault'; from Ancient Greek , , 'arch'; sometimes written apsis; : apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical Vault (architecture), vault or semi-dome, also known as an ' ...

s in

Ancient Roman In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

and traditional church architecture, and in

mosque A mosque ( ), also called a masjid ( ), is a place of worship for Muslims. The term usually refers to a covered building, but can be any place where Salah, Islamic prayers are performed; such as an outdoor courtyard. Originally, mosques were si ...

s and iwans in

Islamic architecture Islamic architecture comprises the architectural styles of buildings associated with Islam. It encompasses both Secularity, secular and religious styles from the early history of Islam to the present day. The Muslim world, Islamic world encompasse ...

. A semi-dome, or the whole apse, may also be called a conch after the scallop shell often carved as decoration of the semi-dome (all shells were conches in

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

), though this is usually used for subsidiary semi-domes, rather than the one over the main apse. Small semi-domes have been often decorated in a shell shape from ancient times, as in

Piero della Francesca Piero della Francesca ( , ; ; ; – 12 October 1492) was an Italian Renaissance painter, Italian painter, mathematician and List of geometers, geometer of the Early Renaissance, nowadays chiefly appreciated for his art. His painting is charact ...

's ''Throned Madonna with saints and Federigo da Montefeltro'', and the example in the gallery below. Islamic examples may use muqarnas decorative corbelling, while in Late Antique,

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 ...

and medieval

church architecture Church architecture refers to the architecture of Christian buildings, such as Church (building), churches, chapels, convents, and seminaries. It has evolved over the two thousand years of the Christian religion, partly by innovation and partly ...

the semi-dome is the classic location for a focal

mosaic A mosaic () is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/Mortar (masonry), mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and ...

, or later

fresco Fresco ( or frescoes) is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster, the painting become ...

. Found in many Ancient Greek exedras, the semi-dome became a common feature of the apse at the end of Ancient Roman secular

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica (Greek Basiliké) was a large public building with multiple functions that was typically built alongside the town's forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek Eas ...

s, which was adopted in Early Christian architecture as the commonest shape for churches, becoming the focal point for decoration. In buildings like

Hagia Sophia Hagia Sophia (; ; ; ; ), officially the Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque (; ), is a mosque and former Church (building), church serving as a major cultural and historical site in Istanbul, Turkey. The last of three church buildings to be successively ...

Byzantine architecture Byzantine architecture is the architecture of the Byzantine Empire, or Eastern Roman Empire, usually dated from 330 AD, when Constantine the Great established a new Roman capital in Byzantium, which became Constantinople, until the Fall of Cons ...

, apsidal openings or exhedras from the central nave appear in several directions, not just to the liturgical east. The tetraconch, triconch and

cross-in-square A cross-in-square or crossed-dome floor plan was the dominant form of church architecture in the middle and late Byzantine Empire. It featured a square centre with an internal structure shaped like a cross, topped by a dome. Architecture Archite ...

are other typically

Eastern Christian Eastern Christianity comprises Christianity, Christian traditions and Christian denomination, church families that originally developed during Classical antiquity, classical and late antiquity in the Eastern Mediterranean region or locations fu ...

church plans that produce several semi-domes. When the Byzantine styles were adapted in

Ottoman architecture Ottoman architecture is an architectural style or tradition that developed under the Ottoman Empire over a long period, undergoing some significant changes during its history. It first emerged in northwestern Anatolia in the late 13th century an ...

, which was even less concerned with maintaining a central axis, a multiplicity of domes and semi-domes becomes the dominating feature of both the internal space and the external appearance of the building. The buildings of Mimar Sinan and his pupil Sedefkar Mehmed Agha are the masterpieces of this style.

Mihrab ''Mihrab'' (, ', pl. ') is a niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the ''qibla'', the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca towards which Muslims should face when praying. The wall in which a ''mihrab'' appears is thus the "''qibla'' wall". ...

s are another common location for semi-domes. In Western Europe the external appearance of a semi-dome is less often exploited than in Byzantine and Ottoman architecture, and is often disguised as a sloping rather than curved semi-circular roof. Cincinnati Union Terminal in

Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

features the largest semi-dome in the

Western hemisphere The Western Hemisphere is the half of the planet Earth that lies west of the Prime Meridian (which crosses Greenwich, London, United Kingdom) and east of the 180th meridian.- The other half is called the Eastern Hemisphere. Geopolitically, ...

, measuring 180 feet wide and 106 feet high.Cincinnati Union Terminal Architectural Information Sheet
. Cincinnati Museum Center. Retrieved on February 8, 2010.

Gallery

File:Hagia-Sophia-Laengsschnitt.jpg, Cross-section of Hagia Sophia, as first built File:Sultan Ahmed Mosque 02.JPG, Exterior of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque Image:Blue mosque Istanbul 2007 Roof.jpg, Interior of Sultan Ahmed Mosque ("Blue Mosque"),

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

. The main dome is surrounded by four semi-domes, three of which are visible in this image. They in turn have smaller semi-domes hanging off them. File:Mosaics in Nea Moni of Chios.jpg, Mosaics in Nea Moni of Chios, 11th century File:Etival-Coquille.JPG, conch niche, 18th century File:Mihrabkls.jpg, Semi-domed

mihrab ''Mihrab'' (, ', pl. ') is a niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the ''qibla'', the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca towards which Muslims should face when praying. The wall in which a ''mihrab'' appears is thus the "''qibla'' wall". ...

niche,

Cairo Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...

File:Parma Duomo di Parma 008.JPG, Painted semi-dome; Parma Cathedral File:Throne in the Hall of Peter the Great.jpg,

Tribune Tribune () was the title of various elected officials in ancient Rome. The two most important were the Tribune of the Plebs, tribunes of the plebs and the military tribunes. For most of Roman history, a college of ten tribunes of the plebs ac ...

with semi-dome, Winter Palace

Notes

References

*Hachlili, Rachel. ''Ancient Jewish art and archaeology in the diaspora''. (Handbook of Oriental Studies. Section 1: The Near and Middle East.) Leiden: Brill, 1998 (
Google Books
*Kim, Tae Won; John H. Christy & Jae C. Choe:
Semidome building as sexual signaling in the fiddler crab Uca lactea (Brachyura: Ocypodidae)
, in ''

Journal of Crustacean Biology The ''Journal of Crustacean Biology'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed scientific journal in the field of carcinology (crustacean research). It is published by The Crustacean Society and Oxford University Press (formerly by Brill Publishers and Alle ...

'', Vol. 24:4 (2004), pp. 673-679
abstract
* David Talbot Rice, Byzantine Art, 3rd edn 1968, Penguin Books Ltd *Vadnal, Jane:
Glossary of Medieval Art and Architecture
' (

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The university is composed of seventeen undergraduate and graduate schools and colle ...

) {{Islamic architecture Arches and vaults Ancient Roman architectural elements Semi Islamic architecture Islamic architectural elements