They were even going to put some bones in this thing................bone collector to Rag and Bone.........store here in DC..........Georgetown.........of Geo Washington............

The term "crypt" has long referred to a space beneath the main floor of a church or a chamber in a mausoleum. For many of us it suggests somber, stony silence and perhaps dusty coffins. The Capitol Crypt, however, is a different thing altogether. This brightly lit circular room below the Rotunda is one of the most heavily used circulation spaces in the building, its sandstone floor trodden by hundreds every day. Visitors weave around the 40 Doric columns and stand on the white stone compass star in the center, where the city's four quadrants meet. Around the perimeter stand statues of prominent individuals from the nation's original 13 colonies, and display cases present exhibits and historic objects. Indeed, funereal would be among the last words one might use in describing its ambience.

Such a description might also have sounded odd to the Capitol's first architects and visitors. On a 1797 plan by Dr. William Thornton, the Crypt is labeled "Grand Vestibule;" on an 1806 plan, Benjamin Henry Latrobe calls it "General Vestibule to all the Offices." In 1824, a report of the Commissioners of Public Buildings refers to it as the "lower rotundo." By 1829, however, the current term appears to have come into popular usage. In discussing "the round apartment under the Rotundo," an article in the Nashville Republican & State Gazette notes that the room "is similar to the substructions of the European Cathedrals, and may take the name of Crypt from them." After that time, the nameCrypt appears consistently in guide books, reports and correspondence.