r (_Cyclopes_ or _Cycloturus didactylus_)
is a native of the hottest parts of South and Central America, and about
the size of a rat, of a general yellowish colour, and exclusively
arboreal in its habits. The name scaly anteater is applied to the
pangolin (q.v.); the banded anteater (_Myrmecobius fasciatus_) is a
marsupial, and the spiny anteater (_Echidna_) is one of the monotremes
(see MARSUPIALIA and MONOTREMATA).

ANTE-CHAPEL, the term given to that portion of a chapel which lies on
the western side of the choir screen. In some of the colleges at Oxford
and Cambridge the ante-chapel is carried north and south across the west
end of the chapel, constituting a western transept or narthex. This
model, based on Merton College chapel (13th century), of which only
chancel and transept were built though a nave was projected, was
followed at Wadham, New and Magdalen Colleges, Oxford, in the new chapel
of St John's College, Cambridge, and in Eton College. In Jesus College,
Cambridge, the transept and a short nave constitute the ante-chapel; in
Clare College an octagonal vestibule serves the same purpose; and in
Christ's, Trinity and King's Colleges, Cambridge, the ante-chapel is a
portion of the main chapel, divided off from the chancel by the choir
screen.

ANTE-CHOIR, the term given to the space enclosed in a church between the
outer gate or railing of the rood screen and the door of the screen;
sometimes there is only one rail, gate or door, but in Westminster Abbey
it is equal in depth to one bay of the nave. The ante-choir is also
called the "fore choir."

ANTE-FIXAE (from Lat. _antefigere_, to fasten before), the vertical
blocks which terminate the covering tiles of the roof of a Greek temple;
as spaced they take the place of the cymatium and form a cresting along
the sides of the temple. The face of the ante-fixae was richly carved
with the anthemion (q.v.) ornament.

ANTELOPE, a zoological name which, so far as can be determined, appears
to trace its origin, through the Latin, to _Pantholops_, the old Coptic,
and _Antholops_, the late Greek name of the fabled unicorn. Its adoption
by the languages of Europe cannot apparently be traced farther back than
the 4th century of our era, at which date it was employed to designate
an imaginary animal living on the banks of the Euphrates. By the earlier
English naturalists, and afterwards by Buffon, it was, however, applied
to the Indian blackbuck,