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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;GinoLR, post: 24853665, member: 128351&quot;]I think this typical architecture of the Tychaion (tetrastyle, triangular pediment with central arch) is not always just the frame of the adyton, at the bottom of the cella like in Sanamein. It can be the whole temple.</p><p><br /></p><p>There are in Bostra (Bosra ash-Sham, Syria) 4 conspicuous columns at a crossroads, not aligned with the streets but at 45°. The gap between the 2 central columns is larger, we can understand there was a central arch. Behind the columns there is no depth : just a monumental central exedra. Howard C. Butler in 1914 understood this monument as a huge niche behind 4 high columns. Because it was at a crossroads archaeologists identified it as a nymphaeum, a monumental public fountain. But recent excavations found there no trace of hydraulic mortar, no basins, no pipes or aqueducts (after all, there is no source of running water in Bostra, water was taken from large pools). The present identification of this monument is a &quot;monumental exedra&quot; of the 2nd c. and the Severian period. </p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1592879[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>Could it be the local Tychaion? A coin of Bostra minted under Severus Alexander shows the Tyche of Bostra (holding a trophy and a cornucopia, flanked by two much smaller centaurs who could mean the Tyche had colossal proportions) in her architectural frame (Not my coin). There are older coins of Bostra with the Tyche, but none with the architecture. </p><p><br /></p><p>There is a parallel in Nysa Scythopolis (Baysan / Beth Shean, Israel): a tetrastyle facade at a crossroads with just a stairway and an exedra behind. Like in Bostra, there is a local coin of Elagabalus showing the Scythopolis Tychaion (not my coin again, sorry). </p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1592880[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>I have found no archaeological publication that considered this hypothesis, in Bostra or in Scythopolis. The only hypothesis I read is that these monuments <i>could be</i> linked with the imperial cult, because at Scythopolis there was the base of a statue of Marcus Aurelius in front of the facade. But hey didn&#039;t find it in the central exedra ![/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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