We report herein ane fficient methodt os ynthesize triptycenes by the reaction of benzynes and anthranoxides, whicha re electron-richa nd readily prepared from the corresponding anthrones. Using this method, 1,9-synsubstituted triptycenes were regioselectivelyo btained employing 3-methoxybenzynes. This methodw as also applied to synthesize pentiptycenes. AD FT study revealed that the cycloaddition of lithium anthranoxide and benzyne proceeds stepwise. Triptycenes 1, [1] whichc onsist of an arene-fused bicyclo[2,2,2]octatriene bridgehead system,a re aromatic compounds with at hree-dimensional rigid molecular structure. Based on this unique structure, triptycenes are widely used in the field of molecular recognition, [2] molecular machine, [3] supramolecular chemistry, [4] materials science [5] and as metal ligands. [6] To synthesize triptycene 1a,c ycloaddition reactions between anthracenes 2 and benzynes 3 [7] are commonly utilized (Scheme 1a1). The conventionalm ethod focusesm ainly on the preparation of arynes, [8] and the easily availableb enzyne precursors do not alwaysp rovide triptycenes efficiently. [8a-f] Therefore, the use of more reactive arynophiles is one way to resolve this drawback, but this was not sufficiently investigateds of ar.I nl iterature, af ew electron-rich anthracenes [9] such as 9-acetoxyanthracenes, [9c,e] 9-methoxyanthracenes, [9a,d,f] and 1,4-dioxysulfonylanthracenes [9i] were appliedi nt riptycene syntheses. These anthracenes,h owever,u sually requireamultistep preparation, are less reactive [9e,h] or are easily oxidized and not isolated in pure form. [9g,i] Thus, it is desirable to develop anthracenes which are sufficiently reactive and easily handled. Recently,w edevelopedanovel one-pot synthesis of triptycenes 1b using at riple cycloaddition of benzynes to ynolates [10] 4 (Scheme 1b). [11] The key of this reactioni st he in situ generation of anthranoxides 6 by ad ouble [2+ +2] cycloaddition of ynolates 4 with two equivalents of benzynes followed by fragmentation of the resulting Dewar anthracenes 5.T he anthranoxides 6 subsequently reactedw ith the third equivalent of benzyne in a[ 4 + +2] cycloaddition.I na ddition, using 3-methoxy-[11a] or 3-silylbenzynes, sterically congested 1,8,13-trifunctionalized triptycenes 1b were selectively obtainedw here three methoxy or silyl groups were located at the same side of the C9-hydroxyl group. Duringt hese studies, we noticed that anthranoxide 6 is ah ighly reactive arynophile for the [4+ +2] cycloaddition due to the strong electron-donating effect of the Scheme1.Synthetic methods of triptycene.