A courtyard or court is a circumscribed area, often surrounded by a building or complex, that is open to the sky.
Courtyard in the Lidzbark Castle, Poland
Courtyard in the Quetzalpapálotl ruin complex at Teotihuacan, 5th century AD.
The Court of the Lions, Alhambra, Granada, Spain
The Great Court at Trinity College, Cambridge, reputed to be the largest enclosed courtyard in Europe.
A courtyard house is a type of house—often a large house—where the main part of the building is disposed around a central courtyard. Many houses that have courtyards are not courtyard houses of the ty
Courtyard
…surrounded by walls or buildings—have been in use in residential architecture for almost as long as people have lived in constructed dwellings. The courtyard house makes its first appearance c. 6400–6000 BC (calibrated), in the Neolithic Yarmukian site at Sha'ar HaGolan, in the central Jordan Valley, on the northern…
"The Abbey", Sutton Courtenay, a typical example of an English medieval courtyard house
Courtyard houses in Beijing
Entrance gate of the Ulli Hovli [uz] ("great hovli") complex in Urgench, Uzbekistan
The central courtyard of a refurbished riad in Marrakesh