page_title: Roman amphitheatre
section_title: The late Empire and the decline of the amphitheatre tradition
hierarchical_section_title: Roman amphitheatre / History / The late Empire and the decline of the amphitheatre tradition
caption_attribution_description: English: Arles amphitheater before houses were cleared (starting 1825)
context_page_description: Roman amphitheatres are Roman theatres – large, circular or oval open-air venues with raised seating – built by the ancient Romans. They were used for events such as gladiator combats, venationes and executions. About 230 Roman amphitheatres have been found across the area of the Roman Empire. Early amphitheatres date from the Republican period, though they became more monumental during the Imperial era.
  Amphitheatres are distinguished from circuses and hippodromes, which were usually rectangular and built mainly for racing events, and stadia, built for athletics, but several of these terms have at times been used for one and the same venue. The word amphitheatrum means "theatre all around". Thus, an amphitheatre is distinguished from the traditional semicircular Roman theatres by being circular or oval in shape.
context_section_description: Several factors caused the eventual extinction of the tradition of amphitheatre construction. Gladiatorial munera began to disappear from public life during the 3rd century, due to economic pressure, philosophical disapproval and opposition by the increasingly predominant new religion of Christianity, whose adherents considered such games an abomination and a waste of money. Spectacles involving animals, venationes, survived until the sixth century, but became costlier and rarer. The spread of Christianity also changed the patterns of public beneficence: where a pagan Roman would often have seen himself as a homo civicus, who gave benefits to the public in exchange for status and honor, a Christian would more often be a new type of citizen, a homo interior, who sought to attain a divine reward in heaven and directed his beneficence to alms and charity rather than public works and games.
  These changes meant that there were ever fewer uses for amphitheatres, and ever fewer funds to build and maintain them. The last construction of an amphitheatre is recorded in 523 in Pavia under Theoderic. After the end of venationes, the only remaining purpose of amphitheatres was to be the place of public executions and punishments. After even this purpose dwindled away, many amphitheatres fell into disrepair and were gradually dismantled for building material, razed to make way for newer buildings, or vandalized. Others were transformed into fortifications or fortified settlements, such as at Leptis Magna, Sabratha, Arles and Pola, and in the 12th century the Frangipani fortified even the Colosseum to help them in Roman power struggles. Yet others were repurposed as Christian churches, including the arenas at Arles, Nîmes, Tarragona and Salona; the Colosseum became a Christian shrine in the 18th century.
  Of the surviving amphitheatres, many are now protected as historic monuments; several are tourist attractions.
caption: The Arles Amphitheatre as a fortified settlement, 18th-century engraving
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