(μέγαρον; mégaron). Architectural feature mentioned several times in the Homeric epics (e.g. Hom. Od. 2,94; 19,16; 20,6). It was evidently the main room of the palace or house with the communal hearth in the centre. On later mentions of megara. in Greek literature (esp. Hdt. 7,140f.) cf. Temple.
Scholarship on the archaic period contains considerably different ideas about the understanding of the term megaron and the derivation of the corresponding building forms connected with it at different times. On the one hand, the megaro…