HEMICY´CLIUM
HEMICY´CLIUM (
ἡμικύκλιον), a semicircle, is used in much the same senses as
EXEDRA (
q. v.). 1. A recessed seat, either
semicircular in shape or, sometimes, a smaller segment of a circle;
Vitruvius (
5.1.8) describes one built by
himself, which was 46 feet long and 15 deep; it formed the tribunal of a
basilica (Guhl and Koner, ed. 5, p. 527). 2. A hall or colonnade furnished
with such recesses, and employed for purposes of conversation, either in
private houses (
Cic. de Am. 1）
or in places of public resort; coupled with palaestrae, as a sort of clubs
for social meeting and gossip (
Plut. Alc. 17,
Nic. 12). In this sense it approaches the meaning of
LESCHE (Hermann-Blümner,
Privatalterth. p. 126, n. 5). 3. A semicircular stone or
marble alcove in the streets or squares of a town, or in the open air
generally. Two such are still standing in the Street of Tombs outside the
walls of Pompeii, near the gate leading to Herculaneum; one of these is
figured by Rich s.v. a third is at the back of a small apartment open to the
street (
Mus. Borbon. xv. tav. 25, 26). Another, containing a
fountain, is in the grounds of a Roman villa at Euren near Trier or
Trèves (Guhl and Koner, p. 576). 4. A convex sundial, figured and
described under
HOROLOGIUM
[
P.S] [
W.W]
