The Colosseum of Rome

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I booked a romantic weekend to celebrate our ten years with my partner, as he is Italian, I decided to go to Rome and it's good, he never went 'opportunity.

What is practical when on an Italian companion is that on the spot he speaks the language of the country anyway here in Italy and we are immediately better received than when we do not speak the language like most tourists.

I went once to Rome with the school but it was raining a lot so I have the memory of having passed the coliseum under a pouring rain limit. I would like to go back and visit the dry at my ease.
I love the atmosphere around and inside the coliseum it reminds me of my Latin lessons and all the gladiator stories that my teacher told us and we studied. I also liked the movie Gladiator with Russel Crow, a great movie full of action and emotions!
My companion, Flavio, often sold himself that the Coliseum bears his name and indeed, originally the Coliseum of Rome was called the Flavian Amphitheater.

It is a huge amphitheater that has an egg shape located in the center of the city of Rome, it is the largest ever built in the Roman Empire. It is one of the greatest works of Roman architecture.

Its construction began between 70 and 72 AD under the emperor Vespasian, and ended in 80 under Titus.
The name of Flavian amphitheater derives from the family name of the two emperors Vespasian and Titus.
This amphitheater can accommodate between 50000 and 75000 spectators, used for wild animal fights, gladiator fights and other public spectacles, such as executions of death row inmates, reconstructions of famous battles and dramas. Roman mythology.

He stayed in service for 500 years.

For its inauguration, Titus gives a naumachie (show representing a naval battle, It involves a show, It involves a spectacle of a water and places for spectators, the mobilization of fleets and the commitment of many fighters. exceptional that the emperors are organized) in the Colosseum transformed into a pool reconstituting the naval battle of Corinth against Corcyra. The building was finally used during the Middle Ages.

It was later reused for various uses such as dwellings, craftsmen's workshops, the seat of a religious order, a fortress, a quarry and a Christian Catholic sanctuary.

The Colosseum is currently in a state of ruin, due to the damage caused by earthquakes and the recovery of stones, but it continues to show the strength and grandeur of the ancient power of Imperial Rome.

Today, it is one of the symbols of modern Rome, one of its most popular tourist attractions and still has strong links with the Roman Catholic Church, in fact, every Good Friday, the pope leads a procession to torches on a way of cross leading to the amphitheater. The Colosseum is represented on the Italian coin of 5 cents.

His name

The initial Latin name of the Coliseum was Flavium amphitheatrum. The monument was built by the emperors of the Flavian dynasty to offer the citizens shows, hence its original name.
The name of Colosseum is derived from that of a colossal statue of Nero erected nearby.

This statue was later modified by the successors of Nero in a figure of Helios, god of the sun, by the addition of the solar corona. Nero's head has been replaced several times by those of various emperors. The statue remained standing during the medieval period and it was conferred magic powers.

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In the eighth century, Bede the Venerable, an Anglo-Saxon monk, wrote a famous epigram celebrating the symbolic meaning of the statue:

"Quandiu stabit coliseus, stabit et Roma ; quando cadet coliseus, cadet et Roma ; quando cadet Roma, cadet et mundus"

"As long as the Colosse lasts, Rome will last; when the Colossus falls, Rome will fall; when Rome falls, the world will fall "

The colossus of Nero eventually fell and we recovered its bronze elements. The name of Colosseum was used around the year 1000, to designate the amphitheater. The statue itself was largely forgotten, and only its base survived between the Colosseum and the nearby Temple of Venus and Rome.

Activities

"morituri te salutant"

"Ave Caesar the men who are going to die greet you"

This is what the gladiators said to the emperor before starting the fight!

The Colosseum has been used to host gladiator fights and other very varied games.

In the morning, after an initial tour on the arena of all the participants to present themselves to the public was held a very popular show: the hunt for wild animals, which used a wide variety of wild beasts, mainly imported from Africa, such as rhinos, hippos, elephants, giraffes, lions, panthers, crocodiles, wildebeest and ostriches. Battles and hunts were often staged in sets with trees and buildings.

In the afternoon the shows called Munera were held.
They had a strong religious connotation but also demonstrated the power and prestige of the family, with the people who appreciated them immensely. These festivities sometimes took an exceptional scale: it is reported that Trajan, in 107, celebrated his victories over the Dacians with games involving 11,000 animals and 10,000 gladiators, for 123 days!!

It is recorded in the accounts of the inaugural games offered in 80 by Titus that the arena filled with water then hosted races of horses and bulls specially trained to swim. There is also a reconstruction of a very famous naval battle between the Greeks of Corfu and Corinth.

Sylvae or country recreations also had their place in the Amphitheater Games. Painters, technicians and architects applied to reconstruct a whole forest, with real trees and shrubs planted in the sand of the arena. This forest appeared gradually populated by introduced animals in turn for the greatest pleasure of the crowd. These scenes could simply show the urban population scenes of the wilderness, or become the backdrop of hunts or scenes illustrating episodes of mythology.

During the lunch interval, on the arena death sentences were executed. When exposed to animals, the convict was usually tied to a pole and pushed towards the animals.

Occasionally, the sets could be used for executions in which the hero of the story, played by a death row inmate, was killed in the manner described by the mythological stories, devoured by big cats for example.
This part of the show was the least popular, many spectators taking the opportunity to eat or refresh themselves at the fifty or so fountains placed at their disposal in the Colosseum.

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Nowadays

The Colosseum today is a major tourist attraction of Rome. Thousands of tourists each year come to admire the arena from the inside.

In, 2001, a museum dedicated to Eros is located on the upper floor of the building.

The Colosseum has also been the site of Catholic ceremonies since the 20th century. For example, Pope John Paul II inaugurated a new form of processions of the Way of the Cross that take place every Good Friday.

The people who maintain the coliseum are in great need of the money collected by the admission tickets, because of the variations of temperature, humidity, earthquakes, water, urban pollution that eats the stone, the overcrowding, ... the Coliseum is damaged. Each year, the Italian state grants him 500,000 euros to keep it more or less in state, in fact, it is not enough to restore it.

The number of visitors to the Coliseum has grown in the last ten years from a million a year to around six million in 2013, thanks in part to the success of Ridley Scott's Gladiator movie in 2000.

Tip

If you intend to go to Rome and visit the Colosseum, buy your tickets in advance on the Internet, it will allow you to go directly and avoid to queue that can sometimes last a good hour .

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