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Architecture.

Also called cavaedium. the main or central room of an ancient Roman house, open to the sky at the center and usually having a pool for the collection of rain water.
a courtyard, flanked or surrounded by porticoes, in front of an early or medieval Christian church.
a skylit central court in a contemporary building or house.

Anatomy. either of the two upper chambers on each side of the heart that receive blood from the veins and in turn force it into the ventricles.
Contemporary Examples

Doctors put the patient on a heart-lung machine before surgeons remove the heart—except for the back walls of the atria.
Dick Cheney Surgery: 7 Essential Facts About Heart Transplants March 25, 2012

Heymann chose not to return messages left with his publisher, atria Books.
Kennedy Fantasies Andrew Goldman July 23, 2009

Glow: The Autobiography of Rick JamesRick James David Ritz (atria Books) Where to begin?
The Best Memoirs of 2014 William O’Connor December 8, 2014

Historical Examples

These lava-streams—some of them reaching to the sea-coast—have issued forth from the atria at successive periods of eruption.
Volcanoes: Past and Present Edward Hull

The atria and peristyles were embellished with valuable paintings and statues.
Foods and Culinary Utensils of the Ancients Charles Martyn

They say that atria was formerly a famous city, from which the Adriatic Gulf, with a slight variation, received its name.
The Geography of Strabo, Volume I (of 3) Strabo

atria regum hominibus plena sunt, amicis vacua—The courts of kings are full of men, empty of friends.
Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources James Wood

The fora and atria were overcrowded with bronze and marble statues and groups.
A Manual of the Historical Development of Art G. G. (Gustavus George) Zerffi

The real hearth, originally in the atrium, had long since vanished from the atria of the wealthy and aristocratic.
Quintus Claudius, Volume 1 of 2 Ernst Eckstein

No mouth opened along the cleft of the cone itself; all the lava issued from that part which extended into the atria.
The Eruption of Vesuvius in 1872 Luigi Palmieri

noun (pl) atria (ˈeɪtrɪə; ˈɑː-)
the open main court of a Roman house
a central often glass-roofed hall that extends through several storeys in a building, such as a shopping centre or hotel
a court in front of an early Christian or medieval church, esp one flanked by colonnades
(anatomy) a cavity or chamber in the body, esp the upper chamber of each half of the heart
n.

classical plural of atrium.
n.

1570s, from Latin atrium “central court or main room of an ancient Roman house, room which contains the hearth,” sometimes said (on authority of Varro, “De Lingua Latina”) to be an Etruscan word, but perhaps from PIE *ater- “fire,” on notion of “place where smoke from the hearth escapes” (through a hole in the roof). Anatomical sense of “either of the upper cavities of the heart” first recorded 1870. Meaning “skylit central court in a public building” first attested 1967.

atrium a·tri·um (ā’trē-əm)
n. pl. a·tri·ums or a·tri·a (ā’trē-ə)

A chamber or cavity to which several chambers or passageways are connected.

Either the right or the left upper chamber of the heart that receives blood from the veins and forces it into a ventricle.

That part of the tympanic cavity that lies below the eardrum.

A subdivision of the alveolar duct in the lung from which the alveolar sacs open.

atrium
(ā’trē-əm)
Plural atria or atriums
A chamber of the heart that receives blood from the veins and forces it by muscular contraction into a ventricle. Mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians have two atria; fish have one.
atria [(ay-tree-uh)]

sing. atrium (ay-tree-uhm)

The two upper chambers in the heart, which receive blood from the veins and push it into the ventricles. (See circulatory system.)