Additional source material

• Ancient Library Sources (from Peter Aicher, Rome Alive: A Source Guide to the Ancient City, vol. 1, Bolchazy-Carducci: 2004) [Works cited]

  70. Colosseum (Amphitheatrum Flavii). Commentary. It is not known exactly when the Colosseum got its name from the colossus next to it, although it was well into the Middle Ages; in antiquity Rome's most famous building was known as the Flavian Amphitheater, or simply as the Amphitheater. A recent reconstruction of an inscription found on one of the Colosseum's blocks [70.1] confirms that the monument had the standard financing, in this case booty from the Jewish War waged by the first Flavian emperor Vespasian and his sons Titus and Domitian. The Romans since time immemorial had staged gladiatorial combat at various venues, including the Forum and Pompey's Theater, and Seneca's account below, written under Nero, shows how sated and desensitized the audience had become even before the Colosseum was built, but Vespasian gave the city an installation it could be proud of, and on land reclaimed for the people from Nero's hated estate. As an icon of ancient Rome, the Colosseum's attractive power today is generated by a strong polarity: on the one hand the structure is a marvel of engineering and design still not exhaustively documented, and on the other it stands as a symbol of depravity, decadence, and cruelty. Our condemnation itself of the arena is, like that of Alypius so famously depicted by St. Augustine, no simple matter, and popular portrayals of the arena in cinema today suggest that any investigation and condemnation of the arena, with its manic emperors and craven (but ultimately good-hearted) crowds, that didn't at the same time give us serious bloodsport would be a box-office flop; we condemn, and get in line. Even the crosses later stationed in the arena as a witness to its crimes partake of the complexity of the fascination with gruesome deaths. In several ways, the Colosseum is also a fitting symbol for the Roman empire in its physical extent. The entertainment there was geographically coded, featuring both human combatants from distant lands trained in the characteristic fighting skills of those lands, and exotic animals from all reaches of the empire. The environmental impact was significant: ecologically as well as architecturally, the Colosseum resembles nothing so much as the mouth of a lamprey. One curious consequence of Rome's voracious consumption that emptied some lands of animal species was a proliferation of species of plant life in the Colosseum: before the overgrowth of vegetation was cleared away in 1871, over 400 species of plants grew on the ruins, a variety made possible both by the seeds attached to or ingested by animals supplied for the games, and the Colosseum's special microclimate. Frequently damaged by lightning and earthquakes, the Colosseum was repaired up into the C6, when the last of the animal hunts was held there (gladiatorial games, gradually withering under a Christian ethos, ceased to be held there in the early fifth century). After that, although falling progressively to ruin, the amphitheater was put to use as shelter by rich and poor, and the powerful family of the Frangipani built their palace there c.1200. Rome's revival in the Renaissance was at first detrimental for the monument, which was treated as a quarry. In the C15 and C16 many of the large travertine blocks that compose the Colosseum's two outer rings, as well as miles of marble seating, went into the construction and decoration of both municipal and Church and projects, including the facade of St. Peter's. When it was declared sacred ground in 1675, the pillaging stopped, and it was fitted with stations of the cross to commemorate the Christian martyrs who formed one class of the criminalized who met their end here. The massive structural buttresses that terminate the outer rings, retarding further dilapidation, are papal projects of the early 1800s. 70. Colosseum (Amphitheatrum Flavii). Sources. 70.1. The Emperor Vespasian ordered a new amphitheater to be built from the booty [of the Jewish War in AD 70]. Inscription (see Claridge, p. 278) 70.2. Vespasian built an amphitheater in the middle of Rome, a building he knew Augustus had also been planning. Suetonius, Vespasian 9.1 70.3. The emperor Titus was second to none of his predecessors in his provision of public entertainment. When the Amphitheater was dedicated [in AD 80] along with the baths hastily constructed next to it, Titus gave phenomenally lavish and expensive games. He also put on a mock naval battle in the old Naumachia [a stadium designed to be flooded], and then held gladiatorial combats in the same place, which on one day alone included 5,000 wild animals of all kinds. Suetonius, Titus 7.3 70.4. During his reign [AD 79-81] Titus did little that was exceptional, apart from the incredible shows he gave for the dedication ceremonies of the hunting theater [the Colosseum] and the baths that are named after him. One contest pitted whooping cranes against each other; in another four elephants fought. Animals both tame and wild were slaughtered, to the number of 9,000. Women (though none of any standing) took part in the killing; many men fought in single combat, but many others fought in squads, on both foot and in boats, since Titus had this same theater quickly flooded … Others also fought on boats in the basin in the Gardens of Gaius and Lucius [the Naumachia], which Augustus had excavated for just such battles.… Such spectacles lasted for one hundred days. Titus supplemented them with some more useful entertainment: he threw little wooden balls down on the audience of the amphitheater, each inscribed with a little picture of the prize that those who caught the balls could pick up from the appropriate officials: the prizes included food, clothing, vessels of silver and gold, horses, mules, cattle, and slaves. On the last day of his games, Titus was seen to weep. When they were over, he accomplished nothing great, dying the following year. Dio, History 66.25 70.5. The Emperor Commodus [AD 180-192], initially an avid spectator of the gladiatorial shows, then participated in them is well. In the arena, he would drape his bare shoulders in a purple cloth.… Although the audience would cheer his frequent appearances in the arena as they would a god's, he suspected it was all in mockery and had the naval crew (stationed at the Colosseum to work the awnings) execute spectators. Imperial Lives, Commodus 15.3,6 70.6. [Bad omens abounded in the short reign of Macrinus, Caracalla's successor. In AD 217] the hunting theater was struck by lightning on the very day of the Vulcanalia which started such a serious fire that the entire upper ring and the arena at the bottom were consumed by flame, and the rest of the structure in between was cracked and weakened by the fire.… For several years, gladiatorial combats had to be put on in [Domitian's] Stadium. Dio, History 79.25.2, 3 70.7. The Emperor Alexander Severus [c. AD 230] placed a tax on pimps and both male and female prostitutes, with the stipulation that the income thus raised go not into the public treasury but towards the cost of restoring the Theater, the Circus, the Amphitheater, and the Stadium. Imperial Lives, Severus Alexander 24.3 70.8. [Visiting Rome for the first time in AD 357] the emperor Constantius II gazed over the regions of the city and suburban estates that ringed it, thinking, as each object met his view in turn, that it excelled everything else in height: the Temple of Jupiter, rising above its surroundings the way divine things rise over earthly; the imperial baths, piled high to the volume of a province; the sturdy mass of the Amphitheater encased in its frame of travertine, soaring to heights difficult to reach with the human eye. Ammianus, History 16.10.14 70.9. [In AD 508] the consul Venantius Basilius repaired at his own expense the arena and the podium around the arena after they were destroyed by a terrible earthquake. ILS 5635 = CIL 6.32094 70.10. Seneca to Lucilius: [Note: Seneca's account was written before the Colosseum was built.] You ask me what, above all else, we should avoid in life? The crowd, I say. You are not yet ready to expose yourself to it unscathed. In fact, I'll confess my own weakness in this regard: I never bring back home the same morals I had before I entered a crowd. Nothing, however, compares with the damage done to a good character by spending time in the crowd at the games.… The other day I happened to attend the midday intermission of a gladiatorial show, expecting to catch something amusing and refreshing, something to give the eye a break from all the human gore. I couldn't have been more mistaken. The midday show made the earlier fighting look like compassion; this was pure homicide, without any of the former frills.… There were no helmets and no shields. Why involve armor, or skill? Such things would just get in the way of death. In the morning, men are thrown to lions and bears; at midday they are thrown to the spectators. Those who are victorious and kill their opponent are forced to face others who will kill them; the victor must always fight again, until he dies; there is no way out but death. To make sure the fights continue, the criminals are prodded with spears and branded by fire. This is what happens when the arena is empty, between shows. “But the man in the arena is a robber, he killed someone!” you might respond. But why should you have to sit through such a spectacle because he killed someone? What did you do wrong, that you deserve to witness this? “Kill! Strike! He hangs back: burn him! … Why doesn't he die with more enthusiasm? Whip him back into the fight.” And if there is a break in the action: “Boring! Let's have some throats slit!” Seneca the Younger, Letters 7, selections 70.11. My friend Alypius had come to Rome before me [c. AD 380] with the intent of learning law, and was swept away by a violent and extraordinary passion for gladiatorial shows. Until then he detested and avoided such entertainment, but one day some of his friends and schoolmates ran into him on their way back from lunch, and although he resisted and spoke strongly against joining them, they dragged him off with friendly force into the amphitheater on a day that featured cruel and mortal combat. “Maybe you can drag my body into the stadium,” Alypius said, “but can you force my mind and eyes to attend such entertainment? I will be present, and yet absent, and so defeat both you and the games.” When his friends heard this, they pulled him along with no less enthusiasm, perhaps eager to find out if he was able to make good on his boast. By the time they were able to find seats, the crowd was in a state of brutal rapture. Alypius shut tight the doors of his eyes, forbidding his mind from paying attention to such evils. If only he could have sealed his ears! For when, in response to some knock-down in the arena, the giant roar of the entire crowd pounded on him, Alypius, overcome by curiosity but still confident that he could condemn and be the master of whatever he looked on, opened his eyes. Struck with a wound more deadly for his soul than for the body of the man who was the object of his sight, he fell, and fell more pitifully than that man whose fall occasioned the uproar.… For as soon as he saw the blood, he drank up the savagery, and did not then look away, but stared and swallowed the fury without knowing that he drank, thrilled by the crime of the combat and intoxicated by the bloodlust. No longer was he the person who had entered, but one of the crowd he had joined; he was now the true companion of those who had led him in. St. Augustine, Confessions 6.8 89. Stadium of Domitian; Concert-Hall (Odeum). Sources. 89.6. [In AD 217 the Colosseum was struck by lightning and badly damaged in the resulting fire.] As a result, gladiatorial combats were held in the Stadium for many years. Dio, History 79.25.3