The Colosseumis roughly elliptical in shape, with its long axis, oriented WSW-ENE, which measures 188 metres and the short one 156. The building stands on a base of two steps; above it there are three floors of arcades and a fourth storey without arches but with small rectangular windows. There were eighty arches on every floor, divided by …
The Greeks are famous for their brains; the Romans for their drains In the Colosseum,rainwater was collected in the cavea by concentric ducts and poured into vertical pipes leading to the ground floor. From there the water flowed partly towards the arena and partly towards the outside, because of a double incline of the floor. On …
Click here for a page of figures and plans In order to plan an amphitheatreit is necessary to coordinate the dimensions of the arena, of the cavea (the auditorium), and the length of the external perimeter, which in turn is necessary in order to calculate the number and width of the external arches and the area …
Many have tried to understand how the velarium was mounted and how could be operated. Here I want to collect some of the most interesting hypothesis that can be found on the web. 1 – These French researchers give a very detailed explanation, with all the calculations and the plans. Here below are their models of the …
Like many other thingsalso the seven hills of Rome have changed during the centuries. King Numa Pompilius established the festival of the Septimontium (seven hills), that was celebrated on the 11th of December by a procession that did the round of the graves of the Argei on some hills. The Argei were the heroes that according to …
In Rome, the capital city of the Empire,a very complex organisation for the production of the amphitheatre shows was established since the first century AD. The Ratio a Muneribus, a kind of Ministry of the Games, had the task of organising the hunts and the munera.The pegmata were the machines that emerged in the arena …
This pictures show the cutting of Via dei Fori Imperiali through the Velia, one of the seven hills of Rome, razed in 1932/33 to make space for Via dell’Impero (now Via dei Fori Imperiali) to the point that today it is difficult even to imagine it was there.At the time they did the job in a …
What is leftof the marble decorations of the Colosseum? We know that the materials were plundered and re-used in many buildings of the city.In the amphitheatre the marble elements were: – the columns in the portico in summa cavea– the barriers of the entrances in the cavea– decorations around the arena and along the corridors around the …
In the XVIII centuryit became fashionable for the rich to collect models of buildings, ruins and famous monuments, made of wood or cork. This craft, that originated in Naples in the XVI century with the scenarios of the cribs, developed to the benefit of wealthy collectors and travelers who only then had started to consider …
