The Charola was the Knight´s private oratorium in Tomar Portugal

The Castle of Tomar was founded by Gualdim Pais in the reign of D. Afonso Henriques (1160). Its construction was linked to the process of reconquest started in that reign and to the role then played by the Order of the Templars. Charola was born inside the walled perimeter of the castle, as a private oratory of the Knights. It presents a plan centered in a roundabout, typical of the religious-military orders, in particular the Order of the Temple, either as an invocation of the Holy Sepulchre, from Jerusalem (which will have been the first example of a basilica-martyrium built in the Holy Land), or by associating itself with the image of the Dome of the Rock (the mosque of Kubbat-al-Sakhara, 688-691) that was then identified with the Temple of Solomon, on whose ruins it sat.