293 



AMPHITHE'ATRE. 



AMPHITHE'ATRE. 



294 



smaller area, and consequently within more convenient view of the 

 arena. 



At first, and for some time, amphitheatres were constructed of 

 timber. Several accidents occurred, indeed, in consequence of the use 

 of such, from fire, and from their incapacity to bear the weights they 

 were subjected to ; and, in one instance, it is related (Tacitus, ' Annal.' 

 iv. 62 ; Suetonius, ' Tiber." 40), that an amphitheatre of this kind fell 

 during the exhibition of the shows, in the town of Fidena, when 

 a very large number of persons, variously stated at 20,000 and 50,000, 

 were either killed or hurt. Afterwards they were more securely and 

 more permanently constructed of brick or stone, according to the 

 facilities the place afforded, or the means of the people at whose 

 expense the structures were raised. 



It was in the latest period of the Republic that the Romans were 

 debased by the gladiatorial and other shows which led to the use and 

 construction of amphitheatres ; and to the gratification of this passion 

 for demoralising public spectacles may be attributed, in some degree, 

 its eventual overthrow, in all but form, and the establishment of the 

 despotism of the emperors. All the powerful men in the state who 

 aimed still higher, sought favour with the people by these barbarous 

 entertainments ; and the sums expended and the numbers of men and 

 beasts engaged, and for the most part destroyed, in furnishing them 

 seem almost incredible. 



The difference in the national characteristics of the Greeks and 

 Romans is by nothing more forcibly illustrated than by the constant 

 indications of theatres or odeums which mark the sites or immediate 

 vicinities of ancient Greek cities, and the remains of amphitheatres 

 which are common to those of the Romans. 



To save unnecessary expense, the Grecian theatre was formed on 

 or hi the side of a hill, whenever the locality would afford this 

 advantage ; the seats were generally cut in the living rock, and such 

 constructions added before it in the formation of the orchestra and 

 proscenium and their accessories, as were absolutely necessary to com- 

 plete the theatre. The amphitheatre of the Romans was raised, for 

 the most part, within the town or city, on the level plain, of costly 

 magnificence, and generally of enormous extent, while then 1 theatres 

 are in every respect secondary, and of inferior importance. Indeed, 

 theatres for music and the drama are seldom found among the remains 

 of purely Roman cities, but almost every Roman colony, and even 

 camp, bears indications of a constructed or excavated amphitheatre. 

 The great mother city of Rome herself can hardly be said to exhibit 

 the remains of a theatre, unless it be that which is called the theatre 

 of Marcellus ; and even this appears to have been more used for games 

 of the circus, or amphitheatrical shows, than for dramatic represen- 

 tations, and is not of extraordinary extent. But the Colosseum would 

 contain from eighty to a hundred thousand persons ; and the little 

 city of Pompeii, which has indeed two theatres, hag, moreover, an 

 amphitheatre, whose arena alone would contain them both. The 

 Grecian cities of Sicily, on the contrary, exhibit remains and indica- 

 tions of spacious theatres where those of the amphitheatres of their 

 Roman masters are few and unimportant ; and the old cities of Greece 

 itself, and the Grecian cities of Asia Minor, are almost entirely free 

 from the pollution of the amphitheatre, the Roman garrisons ap- 

 pearing to have contented themselves with castrensian or camp-built 

 amphitheatres alone. Of this sort, the castrensian amphitheatre, 

 we have indications still existing in England ; the principal are at 

 Banbury, Cirencester, Dorchester, Richborough, Silchester, and Caer- 

 leon ; but these were originally little more than mere excavations, or 

 turf-built cinctures made up with what walling was absolutely neces- 

 sary to form the grand concentric bank of benches. In the provinces 

 of Gaul, both transalpine and cisalpine, Nlmes and Verona, by the 

 remains of their amphitheatres, show how much more completely the 

 inhabitants were nationalised, or Romanised, than were those of Greece 

 or of Britain. 



There is, perhaps, no species of structure peculiar to the Romans, 

 with the details of which we are so well informed, as of those of the 

 amphitheatre, and there is hardly any one of which we have fewer 

 descriptions by ancient writers. The remains which still exist in 

 various places tell us much more plainly what they were than the 

 most elaborate descriptions can do ; and although there is no example 

 of an amphitheatre in complete preservation, or even nearly so, yet the 

 existing specimens preserve the various parts so completely, that there 

 w but little difficulty in supplying from one of them what is defective 

 in another. Still there are minor particulars of which we must remain 

 ignorant, unless we take them from such descriptions as exist, or sup- 

 ply them from analogy. We know of no sort of ancient edifice, gene- 

 rally, in which so much ingenuity is displayed in the arrangement, or 

 so much skill in the construction, as were exemplified by the Romans 

 in the design and execution of the amphitheatre ; but for architectural 

 character, the external composition of the amphitheatre is very far 

 from being entitled to praise. 



As the most remarkable, and one of the most perfect in its details, 

 of the remaining examples of the amphitheatre, that which is known 

 as the Colosseum at Rome is here used to illustrate this kind of edifice ; 

 the plan and elevation are almost entirely made out from the existing 

 remains; and the section also, to a certain extent, as well as from 

 the analogy afforded by other examples and from probability. The 

 vignette sketch at the head of this article is a view of the amphi- 



theatre of Verona, as it exists, looking down into it ; this will aid the 

 section in giving an idea of the arrangement of the benches, and the 

 mode of access to them. 



The form of the external periphery of the plan is that of an ellipsis, 

 whose conjugate diameter, or minor axis, is to the transverse, or major 

 axis, as five to six, nearly, the length through, from outside to out- 

 side of the external wall, being 620 feet, and the breadth to the samu 

 extent, 513 feet; but as these dimensions are variously stated by 

 different authorities, something may be allowed for inaccuracy, and 

 the proportion between one diameter and the other may be fairly 

 assumed in the original draft to have been as above stated. Of course, 

 in the diminishing series of concentric walls, the proportion of the 

 ellipsis is continually altering, so that the diameters of the arena are 

 as five to eight, as nearly as may be, the length being 287 feet, and 

 the breadth 180 feet. The difference between the external and in- 

 ternal diameters, of 333 feet, or 166 ft. 6 in. at each end, is occupied by 

 four corridors and two blocks of radiating substructions, in, or be- 

 tween, which are the staircases and ways from the outer corridors to 

 the inner, and to the arena, together with the concentric or encircling 

 walls which gird the structure, separate the corridors, and enclose the 

 arena. Two of the surrounding corridors lie together, or adjoin each 

 other, on the outer side ; and in this particular the Colosseum exceeds 

 every other structure of the kind of which we have any knowledge, all 

 the rest having but one only ; it thus acquires a second gallery, as 

 may be perceived by referring to the section, in which, also, it is 

 singular. The space covered by this immense edifice will be found to 

 be little short of six acres. Seats were provided for 80,000 spectators ; 

 while the arena was sufficiently capacious to admit of several hundred 

 annuals fighting within it at one tune, or the evolutions of numerous 

 vessels hi mimic sea-fights, and several other exhibitions requiring 

 great amplitude of space. 



The outer encircling wall is pierced with eighty openings, leaving, of 

 course, an equal number of piers ; every opening is arched, and in or 

 against every pier is a column projecting about half its diameter, aud 

 supporting an entablature which runs in an unbroken line all round 

 the structure. With the exception of the four central openings, which 

 lie on the diameters of the ellipsis, and are each nearly two feet wider 

 than the rest, all the openings are very nearly the same, their width 

 being 14 feet 6 niches. An exactly similar series of arches, diminished 

 only in proportion to the smaller extent of the ellipsis, separates the 

 second corridor from the first ; and another, bearing the same relation 

 to the second series, that the second does to the first, or outer, bounds 

 the second corridor. The inner faces of the outer piers, both faces of 

 the piers of the intermediate series, and the outer faces of the piers 

 of the innermost series, have pilasters projecting from them, cor- 

 responding in height with the external columnar ordinance, and bear- 

 ing a moulded architrave from the top of which semicircular arches 

 are turned over the corridors and continued all round the edifice. 

 The accompanying plan and section exhibit the general arrangement 

 of the corridors here described, though the details cannot, on so small 

 a scale, be made obvious. The elevation shows how a second and third 

 columnar ordinance, with corresponding and nearly similar arched 

 intervals, superimpose the lowest, and each other, and that each of 

 these two upper ordinances rests upon a continued stylobate or dado, 

 which is broken into every interval or under every column. The 

 section indicates the repetition of the double series of outer corridors 

 ia every story, or behind every one of the three columnar ordinances, 

 and above the outermost corridor in the third story, a mezzanine, or 

 small middle story, for a corridor behind the first, and under the 

 second, or upper, gallery. The same diagrams show that the third 

 story of columns is superimposed by a pilastrated ordinance on a 

 continued and recessed dado also, with a deep plinth; they show, 

 moreover, that a bold and massive entablature crowns the whole 

 elevation, and runs its cornice round in one unbroken line. 



From the third series of eighty piers, on the ground story, as many 

 walls, with the exceptions to be noticed, run inwards to the third con- 

 centric corridor, which is arched over as the outer ones are ; the walls 

 are continued on the other side of it to the fourth or innermost corridor, 

 which is bounded on the other side by the massive wall of the podium 

 encircling the arena, and is also arched over, though it is not so lofty as 

 the other three corridors are. Between the radiating walls of the two 

 blocks separating the second from the third, and the third from the 

 fourth corridors, are of course as many intervals. Some of these form 

 the traversing passages ; and the rest, in the outer block, contain the 

 staircases which lead to the upper concentric corridors, and so onward 

 to the upper benches and galleries ; in the inner block are those which 

 lead to the lower benches, and small staircases in the thickness of the 

 innermost wall conduct to the benches immediately on the podium. 

 The benches extend in one long graduated and concentric series from 

 the podium up to the level of the second story of the outer corridors, 

 and over all the constructions within the second of them. They are 

 bounded above by a wall which is pierced with doors ; these give access 

 from the upper and inner corridor to the radiating flights of steps 

 which intercept the benches at intervals, and cut them up into wedges, 

 by which name in Latin, cunei, the divisions thus made were distin- 

 guished. This encircling wall has windows in it also, which may have 

 been requisite to aid in ventilating the immense area ; or they may 

 have been intended merely to afford a view of the arena to persons who 



