Page:A history of architecture on the comparative method for the student, craftsman, and amateur.djvu/207

 ROMAN ARCHITECTURE. 149 The amphitheatres are characteristic Roman buildings, being found in every important settlement, and in addition to their normal purposes were used for naval exhibitions, the water drains for flooding the arena still existing in many examples. The modern Spanish bull rings to some degree give an idea of the arrangement and uses of Roman amphitheatres. These are good exponents of the character and life of the Romans, who had greater love for mortal combats, which were considered to be a good training for a nation of warriors, than for the tame mimicry of the stage. The Flavian Amphitheatre, (The Colosseum), Rome (Nos. 62 and 63), commenced by Vespasian m a.d. 70, and com- pleted (with the exception of the upper story) by Domitian in A.D. 82, is the most important example. The model in the Crystal Palace gives a good idea of the general distribution of its parts. In plan it is a type of all the examples, consisting of a vast ellipse 620 feet by 513 feet, having externally eighty openings on each story, those on the ground floor forming entrances, by means of which the various tiers of seats are reached. The arena proper is an oval 287 feet by 180 feet, surrounded by a wall 15 feet high. The seats, in solid stone, rise up from the arena, having under- neath them corridors and staircases. The dens for the wild beasts were immediately under the lowest tiers of seats, and con- sequently opened on to the arena, as at Verona (No. 64). The auditorium has four ranges of seats, the two lower forming the grand tiers, the third separated from the second by a wall, and the top range under the peristyle forming the later addition. Access to the various seats is from the eighty entrances by means of staircases placed between the radiating walls and by corridors, placed at intervals as shown. The radiating walls were cleverly constructed, concrete being used where least weight, tufa stone where more weight, and travertine stone where the heaviest pressures had to be supported (No. 62 b). The masonry was laid without mortar, and the construction is strong and solid, being of an engineering character. The system is one of concrete vaults resting on walls of the same material, 2 feet 3 inches thick, faced with travertine stone, 4 feet thick, and having an internal lining of 9 inches of brickwork, making 7 feet in total thickness. The supports have been calculated at one-sixth of the whole area of the building. The constructive principle consists of wedge-shaped piers radiating inwards, the vaults running downwards to the centre from the high inclosing walls ; consequently no building is more durable or more difficult to destroy — a feeling well expressed by the line : •'When falls tlie Colosseum, Rome shall fall."