caryatid

American  

[kar-ee-at-id] / ˌkær iˈæt ɪd /

noun

Architecture.

• caryatids,
  plural
• caryatides
  plural

1. a sculptured female figure used as a column.

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caryatid British  

/ ˌkærɪˈætɪd, ˌkærɪəˈtɪdɪk /

noun

1. a column, used to support an entablature, in the form of a draped female figure Compare telamon

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• caryatidal
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• caryatides
  plural
• caryatids
  plural

Etymology

Origin of caryatid

1555–65; < Latin Caryātides (singular Caryātis ) < Greek Karyā́tides columns shaped like women, literally, women of Karýai, Laconia

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

caryatid caryatides caryatids

The single square column features crouching figures in the capital who seem to be holding up the arch, a playful evocation of the classical figure of the caryatid or herm.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 21, 2026

Sometimes a caryatid has been compared to the unseen slave who carried society’s burdens.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 15, 2023

Although their name was an architectural inside joke — a caryatid is a type of Greek column that is also a statue of the female likeness — their guileful display took on some serious issues.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 31, 2018

You may think that David Cameron's well-heeled colleagues would give him a marble caryatid bought from the Frieze Masters art fair for his birthday.

From The Guardian ● Oct. 12, 2012

“A caryatid wouldn’t be strong enough for Dad.”

From "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Walls

Such was the apostrophe with which the caryatides of the Café Prosper hereafter greeted the Captain, whose visits became rarer day by day.

From Ten Tales by Walter Learned

It has moreover the rare and distinctive feature of what is known as a caryatid porch, that is to say, one in which the entablature is upheld by caryatides or statues representing female figures.

From Architecture by Nancy R E Meugens Bell

These pulpits are supported by caryatides representing the Evangelists and four doctors of the Church.

From Cathedral Cities of Italy by William Wiehe Collins

We can still contemplate in the court of the Louvre, in the pavilion of the Horloge, those caryatides of Sarazin at once so majestic and so graceful, which are detached with admirable relief and lightness.

From Lectures on the true, the beautiful and the good by Victor Cousin

But such sustaining power, so applied, is like figures of caryatides supporting some poor decadent frieze.

From The Galaxy, June 1877 Vol. XXIII.—June, 1877.—No. 6. by Various

A critic of the day hailed the bravura Hunt caryatids as “full of sentiment, showing a refined imagination, a scholar’s grasp of the requirements and an artist’s appreciation of fitness.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 8, 2026

In it, she and Cardi B dress in Grecian goddess-inspired dresses, dance in front of classically inspired statuary, wear headdresses that evoke caryatids and transform into Grecian vases.

From Salon ● Sep. 4, 2021

Their eccentric profile, isolated against white, forms a kind of muscular torso, not unlike Matisse’s 1909 “Bather,” striding through water, or one of Modigliani’s caryatids.

From New York Times ● Mar. 19, 2020

He sat in a ostentatious Greek-style hall bedecked with four caryatids, the draped female figures used in columns — a style first seen in Delphi 2 ½ millennia ago.

From Washington Post ● Dec. 12, 2019

These marble women are called caryatids, which orginally referred to the priestesses of Artemis at Caryae.

From "Cat's Eye" by Margaret Atwood

Related Words

• monument