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Where in the world

Italy

Colosseum

Roman · Italy

Field notes

civilizations: Roman
types: Amphitheatre
built: 72 CE — 80 CE
occupied: 72 CE — 523 CE
visitors: 7,600,000 / year
country: Italy

The site

The largest amphitheatre ever built, inaugurated in AD 80 under Titus with a hundred days of games. Its four tiers of arches could seat more than 50,000 spectators for gladiatorial combat, wild-beast hunts and even mock sea battles, served by a maze of galleries — the hypogeum — that raised animals and scenery on pulleys. When the games ceased it became fortress, quarry and shrine; medieval earthquakes toppled its southern flank, whose travertine was hauled off to build Renaissance palaces. It endures as the emblem of Imperial Rome.

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