Tholobate

As tambour (Fr., drum ') is a vertical architectural element with a mostly round, less commonly polygonal or oval cross section referred to, which acts as an intermediary above a mainly square building structure and its consisting of a dome or a monastery vault roof.

Function

A drum is used to increase, often the exposure of the dome above the crossing of a structure. Important area to be more prominent by a drum - For churches that formerly could - both architecturally and liturgically.

History

Europe

Although no examples have survived, the earliest drummers were very probably in Roman baths, where they met with their window openings and louvers both exposure and ventilation tasks.

In the Byzantine influenced architecture of late antiquity they appear on churches and tombs (San Vitale and Baptistery of the Arians in Ravenna), then at the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, Opel, and only a little later on the Byzantine cross-domed churches, and in the Armenian architecture. From the Ravenna buildings of the drum of the Aachen cathedral is derived - the earliest of its kind north of the Alps ( cf. Abbey Ottmar home ).

Since the Middle Ages, often exposed drummers play in the architecture of Southern Europe as an architectural element an important role ( Florence Cathedral, St. Peter's Basilica ). Since the late Renaissance and especially Baroque- dip - after the interruption by the gothic architecture - even back to religious buildings in Central Europe (St. Paul 's Cathedral, London; Frauenkirche, Dresden).

In the secular architecture reels occur until very late on and remain extremely rare ( Radcliffe Camera in Oxford, Capitol in Washington).

Islam

As early as the 7th and 8th century reels found in the dome of the mosques - even Byzantine influenced to a large extent - Islamic architecture, stay there but individual cases ( Dome of the Rock, Jerusalem, Umayyad Mosque, Damascus ).

In the 15th century mausoleums ( qubbas ) of the Mamluk sultans of Egypt were provided with high drum - domes.

In the 16th century revolving window wreaths expose all of them inspired by the example of Hagia Sophia Ottoman dome mosques of Sinan in Istanbul, Edirne and elsewhere. However, as with her ​​great predecessor, they only arise to the outside as real drummers in appearance, in the interior, however, the dome approach begins immediately above the pendentives. An increase of the building through the main cylinder is thus not observed in the interior.

Possibly mediated by Armenian architects of the 12th and 13th century, drummers were also known in parts of the Islamic Middle East ( Persia, Central Asia). In the early architecture of India they do not occur; however, they belong to the Mughal architecture of the characteristic components of the double-shelled dome structures, the inner shell, however, is neither increased nor exposed.