page_title: Romanization of Hispania
section_title: Theatres
hierarchical_section_title: Romanization of Hispania / Civil Projects / Urban works / Theatres
context_page_description: The Romanization of Hispania is the process by which Roman or Latin culture was introduced into the Iberian Peninsula during the period of Roman rule.
  Throughout the centuries of Roman rule over the provinces of Hispania, Roman customs, religion, laws and the general Roman lifestyle, gained much favour in the indigenous population, which was compounded by a substantial minority of Roman immigrants, which eventually formed a distinct Hispano-Roman culture. Several factors aided the process of Romanization:
  Creation of civil infrastructure, including road networks and urban sanitation.
  Commercial interaction within regions and the wider Roman world.
  Foundation of colonia; settling Roman military veterans in newly created towns and cities.
  The spread of the hierarchical Roman administrative system throughout the Hispanic provinces.
  Growth of Roman aristocratic land holdings.
  According to historian Theodore Mommsen in the late fourth century the romanization of the Iberian peninsula was practically at 100%
context_section_description: Classical literature, both Greek and Roman, is full of dramas written expressly for public performance, although in reality, the Roman theater has its origins in the Etruscan foundations of their culture. It is however true that very soon assimilated the characteristics of ancient Greek tragedy and comedy.
  The theater was one of the favorite leisure activities of the Hispanic-Roman, and as with other buildings of public interest, any city of renown could do without owning one. So much so that the theater of Emerita Augusta was built almost at the same time as the rest of the city by the consul Marcus Agrippa, son of the emperor Octavian Augustus. In total there are known remains of at least thirteen Roman theaters throughout the peninsula.
  
  The Roman theatre had more important activities than comedies or dramas; it was a venue for celebrations that praised the emperor, it is therefore of a more political, not leisurely nature, although on occasion it may have accommodated all kinds of cultural exhibitions. The vast wealth of theaters in Hispania has to do with the political life of cities and towns which all aspired to have its own theater and therefore solidify their status.
  Other examples are in the city of Baelo Claudia, a city that has an impressive Roman theatre inside the fortress, occupying a huge space. Its construction in a city where only houses have been found only within the fortress, suggests the importance of this civil building: to represent the political force of the emperor.
  Undoubtedly, the best preserved theater in the Peninsula is to Merida, but also the theater of Italica, Sagunto, Clunia, Caesaraugusta and others are part of the archaeological record, and some even host modern theater festivals regularly: they can be considered to be fulfilling the purpose for which they were built, in some cases more than two thousand years ago.
  In the nineties Roman Theatre in Cartagena was discovered and currently under restoration.
  The reconstruction carried out on Sagunto's theater, designed by architects Giorgio Grassi and Manuel Portaceli and carried out between 1983 and 1993 is still mired in both controversy and in legal disputes. A court order requires the demolition of all the reconstruction work and for the return of the theatre to the conditions in which it was before the work was conducted. It seems unlikely however that such a sentence can be executed, since it can not guarantee the preservation of the original theatre due to the scale of the necessary demolition work.
caption: Roman theatre in Mérida
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