Loculus (architecture)
{{Short description|Burial niche}}
{{For|the Roman soldier's kit|Loculus (satchel)}}
Image:Igualada 6.JPG, Spain]]
Loculus (Latin, "little place"), plural loculi, is an architectural compartment or niche that houses a body, as in a catacomb, hypogeum, mausoleum or other place of entombment. In classical antiquity, the mouth of the loculus might be closed with a slab,Katherine M. D. Dunbabin, The Roman Banquet: Images of Conviviality (Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 254. plain, as in the Catacombs of Rome, or sculptural, as in the family tombs of ancient Palmyra.
See also
- Kokh (tomb): sometimes translated as "loculus"
- Arcosolium: another niche-like tomb
- Glossary of architecture
References
{{Commons category|Loculus (architecture)}}
{{Reflist}}
Sources
- {{cite book
| last = Curl
| first = James Stevens
| title = A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture
| year = 2006
| url = https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofarch00curl_0
| url-access = registration
| type = Paperback
| edition = 2nd
| publisher = Oxford University Press
| isbn = 0-19-860678-8
| page = [https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofarch00curl_0/page/880 880] pages
}}