Colosseum
The Colosseum is a key source for Roman engineering, social hierarchy and spectacle culture. The monument also invites reflection on the human and animal victims of Roman entertainment.
Photo: FeaturedPics · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Facts
- Place
- Rome, Italy
- Civilisation / patron
- Roman Empire, Flavian dynasty
- Built
- 70 – 80
- Status
- Ruins
- Height
- 48.5 m
- UNESCO World Heritage since
- 1980
- Seven Wonders of the Middle Ages
- New Seven Wonders (2007)
- UNESCO World Heritage
History
Construction of the Flavian Amphitheatre began under Vespasian and it opened under Titus on land formerly occupied by part of Nero’s palace complex. Rows of arches and vaults supported seating around an arena with extensive underground service areas added later. Events included gladiatorial combat and animal hunts, practices inseparable from coercion, violence and the exercise of public power. Earthquakes and centuries of reuse of its building materials left the partially preserved ruin seen today.
More from: Antiquity
- Great Pyramid of Giza
- Hanging Gardens of Babylon
- Statue of Zeus at Olympia
- Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
- Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
- Colossus of Rhodes
- Lighthouse of Alexandria
- Stonehenge
- Göbekli Tepe
- Parthenon
- Persepolis
- Terracotta Army
- Petra
- Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa
- Teotihuacan
- Abu Simbel Temples
- Great Wall of China
- Nazca Lines
- Stelae of Aksum
- Sigiriya
Sources: Wikipedia — Colosseum