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Juvenal’s sharp social commentary references the tendency of the Roman populace at his time to forgo an interest in government and civic responsibility in favor of the material need of ‘bread and circuses.’
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| Official annual games that disrupted the daily life of Romans with festivity, gladiatorial combat, chariot races, and other competitions. Ludi had a clear economic aspect, allowing typical Romans to either relax in absence from their typical work, or to find money to be made from the throngs of spectators and the events. Additionally, the ludi offered the average Roman the most social transparency possible, in that those of the upper classes were distinctly referenced by their seating and accommodations during the ludi, yet were more accessible than at any other part of the year, allowing for a quasi direct interaction between spectator and imperial family (during the principate). |
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Turning points in the circus and stadium. The meta sudans, resting outside of the Colosseum, was a sort of monumental turning post for the triumphal procession
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| The imperial spectator box. |
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Literally the ‘double theater,’ a venue for gladiatorial combat, wild animal hunts, and executions of criminals and prisoners throughout the empire.
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The sail-like sunshades of amphitheaters.
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| Gladiatorial training school connected to the Flavian Amphitheater by way of a tunnel. The structure was comprised of a four-sided colonnaded portico containing housing for gladiators. In the center was a small arena encircled by a cavea. Built under the reign of Domitian in the late 1st century AD. |
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| One of the venues for the Naumachia, mock naval battles that were accomplished by flooding Naumachia and the Flavian Ampitheater with water. In the case of the Flavian Amphitheater, existing structures may have made the engineering of such a feat possible, as the amphitheater sits on top of the former man-made lake of the Domus Aurea of Nero. |
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| The central barrier in the circus and stadium. Often raised and decorated with obelisks. |
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| Ovid’s guidebook on the ‘art of love,’ references the venues for spectacle as places to ‘pick up’ and get close to women in a way usually deemed inappropriate. |
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| Also called ‘the Colosseum’ from the colossal statue that stood to the northwest of the structure, this structure was the product of the Flavian emperors, begun by Vespasian and finished with Titus and Domitian. The building occupies the site of the artificial pool created by Nero as part of his Domus Aurea, and was part of the Flavian building program to restore the areas formerly occupied by the Domus Aurea to public use. The outermost ring of travertine is four stories tall, with the first three stories comprised of arches framed by semicolumns. The column capitals change from Tuscan on the first story to Ionic on the second and Corinthian on the third. The fourth story contains 240 holes in the cornice that are accompanied by the same number of brackets in the windows that supported the poles to which the velum was attached. A large underground complex was finished under Domitian and provided the capability for flooding as well as a series of underground tunnels and trapdoors. Operators would herd wild animals into the narrow tunnels, operating a lift from a safe vantage point. The ground level is comprised of eighty arches that provided access to stairways and the cavea that were labeled with section numbers corresponding to a spectator’s ticket, or tessera. |
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| An enclosed area for spectacle, from the latin for ‘sand,’ used to soak up the blood from battles. |
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| lit. 'free dinner' at which the Romans would eat to see the gladiators the evening before they fought in the amphitheaters |
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| fights that included wild beasts |
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