beehive house

beehive house, primitive type of residence designed by enlarging a simple stone hemisphere, constructed out of individual blocks, to provide greater height at the centre; the form resembles a straw beehive, hence, its name. The beehive house is typical of Celtic dwellings from 2000 bc in Scotland and Ireland. The tomb of Agamemnon at Mycenae, Greece, is also of beehive shape; but it was made of cut stone rather than of the rough unhewn stone of the Celts.