BEMA (Gr./Bf771a)  , in ecclesiastical architecture, the semi-circular recess or exedra, in the basilica, where the judges sat, and where in after times the altar was placed . It generally is roofed with a half dome . The seats, Bpbvoc, of the priests were against the wall, looking into the body of the church, that of the bishop being in the centre . The bema is generally ascended by steps, and railed off . Iu Greece the bema was the general name of any raised platform . Thus the word was applied to the tribunal from which orators addressed assemblies of the citizens at Athens . That in the Pnyx, where the Ecclesia often met, was a stone platform from Io to II ft. in height . Again in the Athenian law court counsel addressed the court from such a platform: it is not known whether each had a separate bema or whether there was only one to which each counsel (? and the witnesses) in turn ascended (cf . W . Wyse in his edition of Isaeus, p . 440) . Another bema was the platform on which stood the urns for the reception of the bronze disks (l,i~74 oc) by means of which at the end of the 4th century the judges recorded their decisions .