Arena (colosseum)
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Arena is the venetian name for the ancient Roman amphitheatre located in Pula, Croatia. The Arena is the sole remaining Roman amphitheater with all the three orders entirely preserved, as well the only having four side towers.
Arena was built in the 1st century CE, as the city of Pula became a regional center of Roman rule, called Pietas Julia. The name derives from the sand that, since the antiquity times, covered the inner space. The amphitheatre was first built as a wooden one during the reign of Augustus (2-14 CE). The construction of the stone version began probably under the reign of Claudius, to be finished under Titus (up to 81 CE): this hypotesis has been confirmed by the finding of a Vespasian coin in the malting. For the exterior wall limestone was used.
The amphiteater axes are respectively 132.45 and 105.10 meters long, while the walls stand 32.45 m high. It could house a total of 25,000 spectators in the cavea, which had forty steps divided into two meniani. The field for the games, the proper arena, measured 67.95 × 41.65 meters. The arena had a total of 15 gates. Under the construction there were subterraneans from which animals, ludi scenes and fighters were lifted up through elevators; under the step stores and shops were housed. Each tower had two cisterns which fed a fountain with perfumed water.
St. Germanus was martyrized here in the year 284. The amphiteater remained in use until the 5th century, when emperor Honorius prohibited bloody games and the gladiatorial combats. The fights against wild animals, however, was forbidden only in 681: until that date, it could be performed by falsaries or other condemned to death. Anyway, from the 5th century onwards the amphiteater began to be dismantled and its stones used by private citizens for uses of their own. Well into the 13th century, the patriarch of Aquileia forbade any removal of stones from the Arena. It is probable the construction remained rather intact until the following century.
In the Middle Ages the interior of the Arena was used for fairs and tournament by the Knights of Malta, but also for grazing. In 1583 the Venetian Senate proposed to dismount piecemeal the Arena to remount it exactly within Venice, but this eventually was not accepted: a headstone celebrating the Venetian senator Gabriele Emo for this accomplishment is currently visible on the second tower. The last excision from the Arena happened in 1709, for the foundations of the belfy of the city's Cathedral.
In 1816 the Arena was restored by the Ticinese architect Pietro Nobile, commissioned by the emperor Francis I of Austria. In 1932 it was adapted for lyrics spectacles, military ceremonies and popular preassemblies.
