I felt like stepping back in time and scrolled through some of my photos from previous trips. Rome caught my eye, so my photos today are of the coliseum.
Although we’d visited Rome before, we’d only seen the coliseum as we drove past. On this visit I was determined to venture inside.
The thing that fascinated me was the huge scale of the place. You’ll see in some of the following photos that vehicles and the people (both inside and out) appear so small in comparison.
Building on the coliseum began in AD 72 and finished in AD 80. Of course, successive rulers decided to put their stamp on the coliseum and additions were made after this date.
The coliseum held between 50,000 to 80,000 spectators with an average crowd of around 65,000. That is a lot of people. It was used for gladiator battles and during other public occasions. Both animal hunts and executions took place at the coliseum, so the Romans loved their blood sports.
See how the people and vehicles are dwarfed by the arched coliseum?
A shot of the interior.
We toured through the areas where animals and slaves were kept, and it was all too easy to imagine the cheers of the crowd and their excitement.
These days the coliseum is surrounded by modern life with busy traffic and countless tourists plus pollution. During the ages, parts have been reused and repurposed but it is still a magnificent sight and well worth a visit if you’re ever in Rome.
Those pictures are awesome. I’ve never been there but that would sure be something to see.
It is an amazing place. I believe they used it as a film setting for the movie Gladiator with Russel Crowe. You get a sense of how it was from this movie.