B: Hey guys!
You know that old saying “Art Imitates Life?”
R: Yeah, because LEGO just released an absolutely massive set of the Roman Colosseum, and to
celebrate the launch, they’ve asked us to make a video giving some context to its lengthy
history and surprising diversity of uses over the ages.
B: This arena is easily one of the most famous pieces of classical architecture, and it’s
an excellent summation of the ups and downs of ancient Roman culture.
R: Was that a thumbs up thumbs down gladiator joke?
B: I am electing to ignore that question.
SO, with the help of our friends and sponsors at LEGO, Let’s Do Some History!
In the century following the reign of Augustus, the Roman Empire was having a pretty good
time, what with the vast riches, ruling over most of the known world, and not having to
fight a civil war every 30 minutes.
But life wasn’t all shiny temples and perfectly-paved roads, because some of the early emperors
were real pieces of work, like Nero, a self-obsessed tyrant and alleged pyromaniac who built a
palace in the middle of the city after a, let’s say, conveniently-located fire cleared
a spot for him.
But his lavish narcissism and wild unpopularity became an opportunity for the later Emperor
Vespasian, who demolished Nero’s private palace and promised to replace it with something
meant for the Roman public, and in 72 AD, construction began on a massive amphitheater
in the center of the city.
Typically, earlier Greek theaters were semicircular, and carved into the nearest available hillside.
But this Roman amphitheater was fully round and freestanding… and big.
R: Man, you really have to hand it to those Roman Architects.
— B: Boy do we.
But weirdly enough, the name “Colosseum” doesn’t refer to the colossal-ness of the
stadium, but of a huge statue of Nero left over from the demolished palace, later redecorated
into a statue of the sun god Helios.
And while the current building is a little, uh, incomplete, we can see from the surviving
outer wall that the Romans spared no expense in ornamentation.
The amphitheater had three stacked colonnades of the Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian styles,
in ascending order of fance.
R: But Blue, surely they didn’t just build a giant freestanding structure for funsies.
They have to have actually done stuff with it, right?
— B: Honestly, knowing the Romans, I wouldn’t put it past them.
But you’re right, this building was quite the venue.
The Flavian Amphitheater, as it was known in the day, played host to all kinds of events.
There were, of course, the flashy gladiatorial matches that earned Rome so much moral infamy,
but it also held chariot races, parades, animal hunts, reenactments of scenes from mythology
and history, and, somehow, Entire Naval Battles.
Always in pursuit of greater and greater spectacle, the showrunners at the Colosseum could flood
the arena and stage fights between tiny navies.
Those got moved to a separate arena after Domitian installed a maddeningly-complex labyrinth
of machinery beneath the arena.
This Hypogeum was a network of tunnels and some 60-odd lifts that allowed people, animals,
and props to be raised right up into the arena.
In the event of a Beast Hunt, the stage crew could keep the Hunter on their toes by releasing
the next wild animal (or three) from anywhere in the arena.
Drama.
And despite lacking a, uh, roof, the top of the Colosseum was no slouch for stage mechanics,
as it had a series of retractable awnings to keep the spectators nicely shaded.
R: So, uh, what about that stuff I read on the Colosseum seeing some serious action as
a venue for Religious Persecution By Involuntary Zoo?
— B: As it happens, yeah the thing with the lions was popularized during the Renaissance,
but it’s doubtful it ever actually happened.
In fact, that won’t be the first time people misinterpreted the Colosseum.
A millennium after the Fall of the Roman Empire, scholars assumed the building was originally
a giant open-air temple to the pagan sun god; like a bigger, roofless version of the Pantheon.
It took a surprising amount of time for us to figure out that the giant sporting venue
was indeed a giant sporting venue.
After the empire, it obviously fell into disrepair, but it was still in active use, if not for
its original intended purpose.
Because later generations of Romans wouldn’t look a gift megastructure in the mouth, it
was retrofitted with apartments, stalls for food vendors and tradespeople, artisan workshops,
a church, a fortress (briefly, in the 1100s), and, most consequentially, it was used as
a marble quarry.
In fairness to the medieval Romans, an earthquake in 1349 politely dismantled the south wall
for them.
But this practice of reduce, reuse, ruin also applied to the bronze clamps that originally
held the stones together, which later Romans pried off and melted down, hence the speckled
appearance today.
The Colosseum may well have become little more than a sketch in a history book if not
for the conservation instincts of post-Renaissance Romans.
The Colosseum was ordained a holy site in 1749, and after Italian unification in 1871,
Rome began an extensive excavation and preservation program that continues to today.
R: Wow, that’s quite a lively history for an arena built as a glove-slap to Emperor
Nero.
— B: Sure is, and being a gorgeous piece of
architecture designed in service of brutal combat and lavish spectacle, there’s no
better icon for the Roman Empire.
R: And that’s our quick look at the history of the Colosseum!
We hope this helps put some context behind the building and let you better appreciate
the design of this set.
B: Thank you again to LEGO for giving us the opportunity to talk about this today.
If you’d like to check out this beautiful behemoth of a build for yourself, you can
click the link in the description.
R: But like, seriously though, this set is way cool.
B: Oh totally.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get back to building, because this set is
one seriously Big Boy.
Later!