Roman Coliseum Facts

Ancient Roman buildings such as temples, palaces, amphitheaters and houses of the nobles display the advancement in architecture and engineering of that period. The prominent features of Roman architecture were the columns and arches. These features were introduced to construct huge temples and buildings such as coliseums and palaces. Throughout the history of ancient Rome, the architects attached great importance to three styles of columns. They are the "Doric Style", "Ionic Style" and the "Corinthian style". Of the three styles of columns, the Corinthian style is the can be seen as the most popular and dominant columnar style in ancient Roman architecture. Here, we will take a look at the facts of Roman Coliseum, which is one of the landmarks of ancient Roman architecture.

Facts about Roman Coliseum

The Roman coliseum was originally known as the "Flavian Amphitheater". It is a massive building which was constructed during the time of the ancient Roman Empire. The Roman Emperor Vespasian initiated the construction of the Roman Coliseum in the year 70 AD. He was the founder of the Flavian dynasty, hence the name.

The Roman coliseum was completed in 80 AD after the death of the emperor. The next heir to the throne, Emperor Titus, opened it to the public. It is said that the inaugural ceremony lasted for more than 100 days.

The Coliseum was built near the giant statue of Colossus and occupied part of the Nero's park. The current name has been derived from the statue of Colossus.

The Roman Coliseum is an amphitheater that has the capacity to hold 50,000 people at a time. Originally, it had four floors, where the first three had wide arched entrances and the fourth floor had rectangular doorways.

The height of each floor is approximately 32 to 42 feet. The total height of the entire structure is roughly 144 feet. The size of the arena is 79 x 45 meters. In Latin "arena" means, "sand". The arena of the Coliseum consisted of wood and sand. There were tall nets along the sides of the Coliseum to protect the spectators from possible accidents resulting from a fall from such a great height.

The Roman coliseum is a massive building. Travertine is used to build the exterior of the building while tufa and brick were used to construct the interiors. The pedestals are made of marble blocks. The total amount of marble used for the construction was approximately 100,000 cubic meters. The historical evidences reveal that 200 bullock carts were used to transport the marble to the construction site.

The Roman Coliseum had 76 entrances and 4 additional entrances reserved for the emperor, nobles and the gladiators.

Another important fact about the Coliseum is that it has been designed in such a manner that even when filled to it's full capacity, the entire strength of the audience could be dispersed, and the amphitheater emptied, in a matter of five minutes. The interior of the Coliseum is divided into three parts - an arena where the performances used to take place, podiums, and a cavea where the animals used to be confined before combats.

The seats were arranged according to the social status of the spectators. The seats on the first three tiers from the top, were usually reserved for the nobles while the common man used the seats from the fourth tier onwards.

The floor or the arena had subterranean chambers where the gladiators rested before the performance. There were times when the wooden flooring of the Roman coliseum was removed and the entire ground that spans six acres of land was flooded with water. Mock naval battles were enacted here.

The Roman Coliseum is a major landmark and a popular tourist attraction in Rome. It is also depicted on the five-cent euro coin.