Theaters in the Roman Empire: History, Types, Parts

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ROMAN THEATERS


Roman theater in Pompeii

Dramas are still performed in Roman amphitheaters in Verona, Italy, Carthage, Tunisia, Arles France and other places. Some of the theaters had huge walls on which actors and performers cast long, intriguing shadows. Describing the effect with a modern production at a theater in Orange in France, Elaine Sciolino wrote in the New York Times, “As the performers began to move, their shadows rose 100 feet and danced across the imposing backdrop of a yellow limestone wall. A marble statue of Caesar Augustus stood ghostly white upon his perch in the wall, his right arm raised as if he had just commanded the singers to begin their performance."

According to the Metropolitan Museum of Art: “The first permanent theater in the city of Rome was the Theater of Pompey, dedicated in 55 B.C. by Julius Caesar's rival, Pompey the Great. The theater, of which only the foundations are preserved, was an enormous structure, rising to approximately forty-five meters and capable of holding up to 20,000 spectators. At the rear of the stage-building was a large, colonnaded portico, which housed artworks and gardens. Constructed in the wake of Pompey's spectacular military campaigns of the 60s B.C., the theater functioned in large part as a victory monument. The cavea (seating area) was crowned by a temple to Venus Victrix, Pompey's patron deity, and the theater was decorated with statues of the goddess Victory and personifications of the nations that Pompey had subdued in battle. [Source: Laura S. Klar, Department of Greek and Roman Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 2006, metmuseum.org \^/]

“Pompey's dedication effectively canonized the form of the Roman theater, providing a prototype that would be replicated across the empire for nearly three centuries. This new building type differed in striking ways from the traditional Greek theater. The latter consisted of two separate structures: a horseshoe-shaped seating area and a freestanding stage-building. The Roman theater, in contrast, was a fully enclosed edifice, unroofed but often covered with awnings on performance days. “The seating area in the Greek theater was supported against a natural hillside, whereas the Roman theater was carried at least in part on concrete vaults, which provided access from the exterior of the building to the cavea. In the Hellenistic world, the stage-building was a relatively low structure, ornamented with painted panels but rarely with large-scale sculpture. The Roman theater, on the other hand, was characterized by a tall, wide scaenae frons (stage-front) with multiple stories, articulated by freestanding columns and lavishly ornamented with statues of gods and heroes and portraits of the imperial family and local luminaries. \^/

“The architectural differences between the Roman theater and its Greek predecessor are not satisfactorily explained by functional factors such as optics, acoustics, or staging needs. Rather, Rome's adaptation of the Greek theater seems to have been driven largely by social and political forces. The columnar scaenae frons, for example, may have developed to house statuary looted from Greece and Asia Minor by Roman generals and exhibited at triumphal games as evidence of their military prowess. The architecture of the Roman theater also signals Roman concern for social control and hierarchical display. In contrast to the Greek world, where seating in the theater was largely open, Roman audiences were rigorously segregated on the basis of class, gender, nationality, profession, and marital status. This is reflected in both the enclosed form of the Roman theater, which restricted access to the building, and the system of vaulted substructures, which facilitated the routing of spectators to the appropriate sector of seating.” \^/

Early Roman Drama Theaters

During the period when the best plays were being written (200-160 B.C.) by Plautus and Terence, very little was done for the accommodation of the actors or the audience. The stage was merely a temporary platform, the width of which was much greater than its depth; it was built at the foot of a hill or a grass-covered slope. There were few of the things that we are accustomed to associate with a stage; there were no curtains, no flies, no scenery that could be changed, not even a sounding board to aid the actor’s voice. There was no way to represent the interior of a house. [Source: “The Private Life of the Romans” by Harold Whetstone Johnston, Revised by Mary Johnston, Scott, Foresman and Company (1903, 1932) |+|]

“For a comedy the stage represented a street. At the back of the stage were shown, usually, the fronts of two or three houses with windows and doors that could be opened; sometimes there was an alley or passageway between two of the houses. This was the regular setting for the play, and consequently the dramatist was forced to place there scenes and conversations that might normally be expected to take place indoors. |+|

“An altar stood on the stage, we are told, to remind the people of the religious origin of the games. No better provision was made for the audience than for the actors. The people took their places on the slope before the stage, some reclining on the grass, some standing, some, perhaps, sitting on stools which they had brought from home. There were always din and confusion to try the actor’s voice, pushing and crowding; disputing and quarreling, wailing of children; and in the very midst of the play the report of something livelier to be seen elsewhere might draw the whole audience away.” |+|

Parts of a Roman Theater

The general appearance of Roman theaters, the type of many erected later throughout the Roman world, the plan of a theater on lines laid down by Vitruvius is the back line of the stage (proscaenium); between GH and CD is the scaena, devoted to the actors; beyond CD is the cavea, devoted to the spectators. Opposite IKL are the positions of three doors. The first four rows of seats closest to the stage, in the semicircular orchestra CMD, constitute the part appropriated to the senators. The seats behind these front rows, rising in concentric semicircles, are divided by five passageways into six portions (cunei); in a similar way the seats above the semicircular passage (praecinctio) are divided by eleven passageways into twelve cunei. Access to the seats of the senators was afforded by passageways under the seats at the right and the left of the stage, which represents a part of the smaller of the two theaters uncovered at Pompeii, built about 80 B.C. [Source: “The Private Life of the Romans” by Harold Whetstone Johnston, Revised by Mary Johnston, Scott, Foresman and Company (1903, 1932) |+|]


theater in Merida

Over the vaulted passage will be noticed what must have been the best seats in the theater, which correspond in some degree to the boxes of modern times. Those on one side were reserved for the emperor, if he should be present, or for the officials who superintended the games; those on the other side were reserved for Vestals. These reserved seats were reached only by private staircases on the stage side of the auditorium. Access to the upper tiers of the cavea was given by passageways constructed under the seats and running up to the passageways between the cunei. Above the highest seats were broad colonnades, affording shelter in case of rain, and above them were tall masts from which awnings (vela) were spread to protect the people from the sun. |+|

The great width of the Roman stage, sometimes forty or sixty yards, made practicable certain dramatic devices that seem forced or unnatural on the modern stage, such as asides and dialogues on one part of the stage unheard at another, and the length of time sometimes allowed for crossing the stage. In the later theater changes in scenery were possible; the extant Roman plays, however, seldom require change of scenery. It should be noticed that the stage was connected with the auditorium by the seats over the vaulted passages to the orchestra, and that the curtain was raised from the bottom, to hide the stage, not lowered from the top as ours is now. The slot through which the curtain was dropped can still be seen in some theaters, as at Pompeii. Vitruvius suggested that rooms and porticos be built behind the stage, like the colonnades that have been mentioned, to afford space for the actors and properties, and shelter for the people in case of rain. |+|

Vomitorium

A vomitorium is not a room where ancient Romans went to throw up lavish meals so they could return to the table and stuff themselves some more. They were actually part of theaters, so named because it discouraged the audience after a performance. At the 8000-seat marble amphitheater in Aphrodisias in Asia Minor, audiences watched masked and robed actors perform dramas about conspiring slaves and two-timing wives. When the show was over the audience was discouraged out of a gate called the vomitorium .

At the first theaters wooden benches were set up, but later they were replaced by stone or marble seats. The first theaters had a circular orchestra for singers and dancers. This followed the tradition of the early Dionysus festivals when the merrymakers danced around a maypole, altar or image of a god. Theaters built later on had a “ vomitorium”. [Source: "The Creators" by Daniel Boorstin]

Stephanie Pappas wrote in Live Science: As far as pop culture is concerned, a vomitorium is a room where ancient Romans went to throw up lavish meals so they could return to the table and feast some more. It's a striking illustration of gluttony and waste, and one that makes its way into modern texts. Suzanne Collins' "The Hunger Games" series, for example, alludes to vomitoriums when the lavish inhabitants of the Capitol—all with Latin names like Flavia and Octavia—imbibe a drink to make them vomit at parties so they can gorge themselves on more calories than citizens in the surrounding districts would see in months. [Source Stephanie Pappas, Live Science, August 28, 2016]

But the real story behind vomitoriums is much less disgusting. Actual ancient Romans did love food and drink. But even the wealthiest did not have special rooms for purging. To Romans, vomitoriums were the entrances/exits in stadiums or theaters, so dubbed by a fifth-century writer because of the way they'd spew crowds out into the streets. "It's just kind of a trope," that ancient Romans were luxurious and vapid enough to engage in rituals of binging and purging, said Sarah Bond, an assistant professor of classics at the University of Iowa.

The Roman writer Macrobius first referred to vomitoriums in his "Saturnalia." The adjective vomitus already existed in Latin, Bond told Live Science. Macrobius added the "orium" ending to turn it into a place, a common type of wordplay in ancient Latin. He was referring to the alcoves in amphitheaters and the way people seemed to erupt out of them to fill empty seats.

At some point in the late 19th or early 20th century, people got the wrong idea about vomitoriums. It seems likely that it was a single linguistic error: "Vomitorium" sounds like a place where people would vomit, and there was that pre-existing trope about gluttonous Romans.

Classically trained poets and writers at the time would have been exposed to a few sources that painted ancient Romans as just the sort of people who would vomit just to eat more. One source was Seneca, the Stoic who lived from 4 B.C. to A.D. 65 and who gave the impression that Romans were an emetic bunch. In one passage, he wrote of slaves cleaning up the vomit of drunks at banquets, and in his Letter to Helvia, he summarized the vomitorium idea succinctly but metaphorically, referring to what he saw as the excesses of Rome: "They vomit so they may eat, and eat so that they may vomit."

Roman Odeon (Roofed Theater) Found in Crete

Benjamin Leonard wrote in Archaeology Magazine: An excavation team led by archaeologist Katerina Janakakis of the Ephorate of Antiquities of Chania has uncovered ruins of an odeon, or roofed theatrical building, in the ancient city of Lissos on the southwest coast of Crete. Thus far, the team has unearthed 14 rows of seats, two vaulted side chambers, and part of the stage, all constructed from local limestone. [Source: Benjamin Leonard, Archaeology Magazine, May/June 2023]

The odeon was built in the first century A.D., when Lissos was a prosperous Roman city. The settlement was heavily damaged, likely during a devastating earthquake in A.D. 365 that leveled other cities in the eastern Mediterranean. Although odeons typically hosted musical performances and poetry competitions,Janakakis believes this particular building might also have served as a gathering place for government authorities. “Lissos was a small, provincial city,” she says, “so it’s a rather logical assumption that the odeon might have had a double use, judging by its form and location in the center of the city.”

Ancient odeons were used for lectures, literary and musical contests, or theatrical performances. According to Live Science: In the first phase of the odeon's excavation,Janakakis and her team found part of the stage, 14 rows of seats and two vaulted side chambers. The odeon dates to the Roman period, roughly the first to fourth centuries A.D., a time when the sanctuary to Asclepius at Lissos was transformed into a political center with a new mosaic floor and portraits of the Roman emperors Tiberius and Drusus. [Source Kristina Killgrove, Live Science, November 10, 2022]

As the odeon was adjacent to the city center, Janakakis thinks it also might have operated as a bouleuterion, a building for meetings of the city council. Francis and her husband, George W. Harrison, a classical archaeologist at Carleton University in Ottawa, told Live Science by email that the size and date of the building mean that it was most likely an odeon, but the fact that "it was designed and used as a covered theater does not preclude secondary use as a council house."

Later Roman Drama Theaters

Beginning about 145 B.C., however, efforts were made to improve upon this poor apology for a theater, in spite of the opposition of those who considered the plays ruinous to morals. In that year a wooden theater provided with seats was erected on Greek lines, but the senate caused it to be pulled down as soon as the games were over.3 It became a fixed custom, however, for such a temporary theater (with special and separate seats for senators and, much later, for the knights) to be erected as often as plays were given at public games, until in 55 B.C. Pompeius Magnus erected the first permanent theater at Rome. It was built of stone after the plans of one he had seen at Mytilene and could probably seat seventeen thousand people; Pliny the Elder says forty thousand.4 This theater showed two noteworthy divergences from its Greek model. The Greek theaters were excavated out of the side of the hill, while the Roman theater was erected on level ground (that of Pompeius was erected in the Campus Martius) and gave, therefore, a better opportunity for exterior magnificence. The Greek theater had a space, usually circular, or larger than a semicircle, called the orchestra, before the scaena or scene building; this orchestra or dancing-place gave room for the choruses of the Greek drama. |+|

“In the Roman theater the orchestra was not used for the chorus (there was seldom a chorus in a Roman play); the orchestra in a Roman theater was therefore reduced in size until it became an exact semicircle. The seats nearest the orchestra were assigned at Rome to the senators, in the country towns to the magistrates and town council. The first fourteen rows of seats rising immediately behind them were reserved at Rome for the knights. The seats back of these were occupied indiscriminately by the people, on the principle, apparently, of first come, first served. No other permanent theaters were erected at Rome until 13 B.C., when two were constructed. The smaller, that of Balbus,5 is said to have had room for eleven thousand spectators, the larger, erected in honor of Marcellus, the nephew of Augustus, for twenty thousand.5 These improved playhouses made possible spectacular elements in the performances that the rude scaffolding of early days had not permitted, and these spectacles proved the ruin of the legitimate drama. To make realistic the scenes representing the pillaging of a city, Pompeius is said to have furnished troops of cavalry and bodies of infantry, hundreds of mules laden with real spoils of war, and three thousand mixing bowls. In comparison with these three thousand mixing bowls, the avalanches, runaway locomotives, airplane crashes, and cathedral scenes of modern times seem poor indeed. |+

Image Sources: Wikimedia Commons

Text Sources: Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Rome sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Late Antiquity sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; “Outlines of Roman History” by William C. Morey, Ph.D., D.C.L. New York, American Book Company (1901) ; “The Private Life of the Romans” by Harold Whetstone Johnston, Revised by Mary Johnston, Scott, Foresman and Company (1903, 1932); BBC Ancient Rome bbc.co.uk/history/ ; Project Gutenberg gutenberg.org ; Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Geographic, Smithsonian magazine, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Live Science, Discover magazine, Archaeology magazine, Reuters, Associated Press, The Guardian, AFP, The New Yorker, Wikipedia, Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopedia.com and various other books, websites and publications.

Last updated November 2024


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