✍️✍️✍️ Spectacle In Roman Culture Essay
One approaches the Pantheon through the portico with its tall, monolithic Corinthian columns of Egyptian granite. The basilica was commonly situated in the Forum of a Roman city, and was designed as a large White Women In Colonial America hall to be used as a place of general assembly for trade, banking, pros of technology administration of the law: in simplest words, a meeting hall. The Romantic Impulse: Nationalism And Romanticism In American Painting J. Cornell University Press. Special Education. It was mostly about showing off who could afford the richest equipment, who could have the fanciest horses and who could put on the biggest spectacle when they were hosting it. Basically, ancient Spectacle In Roman Culture Essay included Spectacle In Roman Culture Essay their mythological accounts all the peoples with whom they Essay On Modern Society close contacts. The Judean port of Caesarea BCEextended by Herod the Great to please his boss Augustus Caesar, and home of Pontius Pilate, the regional Roman Prefect, posessed a spacious network of gridded streets, a hippodrome, public baths, palaces and an aqueduct. Even today the Spectacle In Roman Culture Essay has dignity and a quiet effectiveness.
What It Was Like To Live In Ancient Rome During Its Golden Age
Similar types of tableware were made of less costly materials, yet they exhibit a high level of craftsmanship. Glass had become especially fashionable and was more readily available in the Roman world following the rapid development of the Roman glass industry in the first half of the first century A. New techniques allowed glassmakers to create vessels in a variety of styles, such as monochrome glass, polychrome mosaic glass Cameo glass , which was made by carving designs into layered glass, was especially prized among the elite for its delicately carved imagery, which was similar to that found on silver and gold tableware Vessels made of terracotta were another affordable alternative. Terra sigillata, a type of mold-made pottery known for its lacquerlike red glaze, was widely popular.
Terra sigillata vessels from Arretium modern Arezzo, Italy , known as Arretine ware, were renowned for their relief decoration, which was typically produced using stamps of different figures and motifs The terra sigillata industry also flourished in the provinces , particularly in Gaul, where plain and decorated vessels were mass-produced and exported to diverse parts of the empire The final component of the banquet was its entertainment, which was designed to delight both the eye and ear. Musical performances often involved the flute, the water organ, and the lyre, as well as choral works.
Active forms of entertainment could include troupes of acrobats, dancing girls, gladiatorial fights, mime, pantomime, and even trained animals, such as lions and leopards. Even the staff and slaves of the house were incorporated into the entertainment: singing cooks performed as they served guests, while young, attractive, and well-groomed male wine waiters provided an additional form of visual distraction. Raff, Katharine. Alexander, Christine. D'Arms, John H. New Haven: Yale University Press, Dunbabin, Katherine M. The Roman Banquet: Images of Conviviality.
New York: Cambridge University Press, Newby, Martine, and Kenneth Painter, eds. London: Society of Antiquaries of London, Oliver, Andrew, and John Shelton. Strong, Donald Emrys. Greek and Roman Gold and Silver Plate. Ithaca, N. Visiting The Met? Pair of silver scyphi cups with relief decoration. Tableware from the Tivoli Hoard. Terracotta bowl Signed by Perennius Tigranus as owner. Silver drinking cup. Bronze handle attachment in the form of a mask. Glass mosaic ribbed bowl. Glass cameo cup scyphus fragment. Terracotta scyphus drinking cup. Terracotta modiolus drinking cup. Glass cantharus drinking cup. Glass modiolus one-handled drinking cup. Bronze furniture attachment. Glass cameo cup fragment. Glass cameo fragment of a large platter or tabletop. Couch and footstool with bone carvings and glass inlays.
Terracotta plate. Glass dish. During the empire, the most common stone used for building was travertine, a form of limestone quarried in Tivoli, as used on the exterior of the Colosseum in Rome. Marble was used only for facing or decoration, or sometimes in mosaics. Coloured marbles and stones like alabaster, porphyry and granite, were also popular, as exemplified by the remains of Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli. The majority of domestic homes were made with a variety of unburned bricks faced with stucco. There were temples in Rome, and throughout her far-flung colonies and provinces.
But they were far less distinctive and inventive than Greek designs of say the Parthenon or other structures; rather they represented the Greek idea adapted and elaborated. The columns usually carried florid Corinthian capitals - the Doric style being too plain to Latin eyes. Decoration was added elsewhere too, so that in the end no bit of bare wall was tolerated. Even the architrave, kept clean by the Greeks to emphasize the feeling of cross-bar strength, was soon being traced over with Roman ornament.
The earlier round structures of the sort illustrated in the ancient Temple of Vesta in the Roman forum, provided an appealing grace and a pleasing ornamental fullness not known to the architecture of the Hellenes. The more usual adaptation of the Greek rectangular temple is to be seen today in the example at Nimes in France, known as the Maison Carree. It illustrates both the survival of the essential Greek form, and the typical Roman originally Etruscan changes, such as the podium or raised platform stylobate with a flight of steps in front, and the substitution of engaged columns or pilasters along the side walls of the cella , in place of the original continuous colonnade.
Even today the building has dignity and a quiet effectiveness. In some cases the cella of the Roman temple was vaulted in concrete; it might also possess a semicircular end, as in the Baths of Diana at Nimes, and the Temple of Venus and Rome, in Rome. The most influential type of religious building developed by Roman architects was the basilica. Originally secular in purpose, it was destined to become an early prototype for the first Christian churches - see Early Christian Art - and thus to affect monumental architecture down to the twentieth century. The basilica was commonly situated in the Forum of a Roman city, and was designed as a large covered hall to be used as a place of general assembly for trade, banking, and administration of the law: in simplest words, a meeting hall.
The standard Basilica plan had a central nave between side aisles; and it was here that clerestory lighting and construction were introduced into European building. A few basilicas were given semicircular halls at the end opposite the entrance, corresponding to the later church apse or altar area. Paul Outside the Walls 4th century CE at Rome, though rebuilt in the 19th century according to the 4th-century plan , illustrates the impressive simplicity and grandeur of the basilica design, combined with late Roman sumptuous decoration.
Where arched construction here surmounts the interior columns, the earlier form had been a continuous architrave, sometimes with gallery above, just under the clerestory windows. It is one of Rome's four most distinguished papal basilicas: the others being the basilicas of St. Mary Major, St. Peter's, and St. John Lateran. The most magnificent example is the 63, square-foot Basilica of Constantine and Maxentius, an awesome example of the cohesion and strength of Roman concrete. A more modern basilica modelled on Roman architecture is Saint Peter's Basilica c. The greatest surviving circular temple of classical antiquity , and arguably the most important example of ancient art produced in Rome, is the Pantheon. Today it has lost its interior embellishments, though it is the best preserved of major Roman monuments; but it takes the breath by the vast dimensions, the simplicity of its forms, and the audacity of the structural design.
A temple-like forecourt or porch lies against an immense foot wide circular hall or rotunda, under a low dome. The engineering is elementary: the rotunda's walls form the drum from which the dome springs direct; there are no windows. Light is admitted to the building solely through a great a foot oculus left open to the sky at the top. In its time the inside of the dome, richly coffered, and the marble trim of walls and apses, must have been impressively sumptuous; but today it is the grand simplicity of the engineering and the great spaciousness that thrill the visitor. The Pantheon is truly one of the world's most impressive buildings. The Corinthian temple facade of the French Pantheon Paris, designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot , is a direct copy of its ancestor in Rome.
The theatres of Rome itself were usually temporary erections, but often were adorned with almost incredibly rich displays of sculpture and architectural accessories, if one may believe eyewitness reports. Some surviving provincial examples indicate, indeed, that the architecture was thought of as part of the spectacle. One Latin description mentions a stage wall with columns, statues, and other "special" adornments. Amphitheatres were public arenas of which are known in which spectacles were held, such as contests between gladiators, public displays, public meetings and bullfights.
There is enough left of the Colosseum in Rome, for instance, to indicate the form and to impress the eye - though the complete interior sheathing of coloured marble has disappeared. Constructed by the emperors Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian c. The 6-acre complex is a marvellous constructive feat: a bowl more than feet long, with 50, or 60, seats resting on a honeycomb structure of arcades and vaults, with passageways for spectators, rooms for the gladiators, and cells for the wild beasts. To that extent the architecture is functional and honest. But the marble facing to a certain degree weakens the mass effect, denies the engineering, and contrasts badly with the necessarily heavy materials.
The columns carry no weight. Incidentally it may be noted that the Emperor Augustus BCE , of the golden age of Rome, who is said to have boasted that he transformed Rome from a city of brick to a city of marble, was speaking in terms of a veneer. Greek monumental buildings had been of solid marble, and the Egyptian pyramids are mountains of laid-up stone, but the Romans seem not to have had the time or the thoroughness to deal in difficult materials even when they had the materials at hand. See also: Late Egyptian Architecture. Amphitheatres should be distinguished from Roman circuses hippodromes - in effect, racecourses flanked by tiers of seats and a central grandstand - whose elongated circuits were designed for horse or chariot racing events; and also from the smaller stadia, which were built for athletics and similar games.
The largest Roman hippodrome was the U-shaped Circus Maxiumus built, rebuilt and enlarged c. It became the prototype for circuses throughout the Roman Empire. Probably the most popular Roman buildings among all classes of citizens were the public baths balneae or thermae akin to Turkish steam baths which by the end of the republic, were a recognized feature of Roman life. The term Balneae usually referred to smaller scale baths, while Thermae described larger, wealthier establishments. It was in the late Imperial thermae , like the Baths of Caracalla, that the spirit of luxurious grandeur in Roman architecture was best expressed. The best of them were regular social meeting places of the upper classes, and were lavished with the most stupendous engineering ingenuity and the most vulgarly ornate architectural decoration.
Not only was an incredible number of pools, gymnasia, anointing rooms, and lounging halls to be roofed over, but lecture and studio rooms had to be included in the interior, and a stadium was to adjoin it. It is said that one thousand bath buildings existed in imperial Rome, ranging from the simplest to the immense establishments known by the names of the emperors who built them, Nero, Trajan, Diocletian, and the like. There are sufficient remains of the Baths of Caracalla to impress the observer today with the daring of Roman engineers in roofing the necessary spaces and buttressing the supporting arches. There are traces of the marble sculpture as well as pavements and mosaics, and contemporary descriptions that aid in building up a picture of magnificent decorations and furnishings.
The design and construction of public baths is discussed thoroughly by the Roman architect Vitruvius in his treatise on architecture De Architectura. The commemorative arches, or arches of triumph, were a sort of ceremonial architecture invented by the Romans in their passion for the show of power, to commemorate an important event or military campaign. They merit hardly more attention than any other ornamental and advertising monument, though there is considerable symmetry and academic competence in the compositions. Typically erected away from the main thoroughfares, they were typically decorated with relief sculpture illustrating the events to be commemorated.
The most famous example is the Arch of Titus, celebrating the capture of Jerusalem, and the Arch of Constantine c. All have served as models to fifty generations of triumphant militarists home from their conquests, including Napoleon Bonaparte, who commissioned the famous Arc de Triomphe in Paris, a masterpiece of 19th century architecture. Triumphal arches perfectly expressed the spectacular-ceremonial side of the Roman character.
An offshoot was the single column memorial, exemplified by Trajan's Column c. The stylistic antithesis of the triumphal arch is probably best exemplified by the Ara Pacis Augustae , Rome c. But in bridges and aqueducts one finds fully asserted again the spirit that is admirable and splendid. These constructions are functional, authentic, mathematical. Waterways strike out across country, overcoming both hills and valleys. Gorges are bridged with those honest spans, repeated, unvarying, everlasting.
This is the supreme architectural memorial of the Roman Empire. In the thick, heavy, power-breathing Roman wall, and in the regimented arches and vaults, one finds artistic Rome and her engineer-architects in their most honest and typical achievement. When she turned to ornamentation, employed other architects to split the functional Greek columns and paste them uselessly beside the arches, in row over row against the walls, the engineer was eclipsed, a curtain of make-believe was dropped before the true drama of Roman building art. The Pont du Gard has come free of those embellishments; it moves boldly, implacably, nakedly on its business of carrying an aqueduct over hill and valley. Roman engineers were famous above all for their high quality roads.
In all, they laid more than , miles of roads, including over 50, miles of paved roads. At the height of the Roman empire, 29 major military highways radiated from its capital, Rome. As well as building roads to facilitate transport and travel overland, Roman architects also erected numerous lighthouses around the Mediterranean and the western shores of the Atlantic, to assist maritime navigation. One surviving example is the famous Tower of Hercules c. Known until recently as the "Farum Brigantium", the lighthouse has been in continual use since the 2nd century CE, making it the oldest lighthouse in the world.
Urban Planning, Houses, Residential Architecture. The city of Ancient Rome - at its height, a huge metropolis of almost one million people - consisted of a maze of narrow streets. After the fire of 64 CE, Emperor Nero announced a rational rebuilding program, with little success: the city's architecture remained chaotic and unplanned. Outside Rome, however, architects and urban planners were able to achieve a lot more. Towns were developed using grid-plans originally drawn up for military settlements. Typical features included two wide axis streets: a north-south street, known as the cardo , and a complementary east-west street called the decumanus , with the town centre located at their intersection.
Most Roman towns had a forum, temples and theatres, plus public baths Thermae , but ordinary houses were often simple mud-brick dwellings. In very simple terms, there were two basic types of Roman house: the domus and the insula. The domus, exemplified by those discovered at Pompeii and Herculaneum, usually comprised a collection of rooms set around a central hall, or atrium. Few windows overlooked the street, light coming instead from the atrium. In Rome itself, however, very few remains of this type of house have survived. In general, only wealthy citizens could afford houses with courtyards, roofed atria, underfloor heating or gardens.
Even then, space constraints in many provincial towns meant that even well to-do houses were relatively compact. Rich cities were the exception. The Judean port of Caesarea BCE , extended by Herod the Great to please his boss Augustus Caesar, and home of Pontius Pilate, the regional Roman Prefect, posessed a spacious network of gridded streets, a hippodrome, public baths, palaces and an aqueduct.
The wealthy Italian port of Ostia, had brick-built apartment blocks called insulae , after insula the Italian for building rising five floors high. Roman architecture has had a colossal influence on building construction in the West. If Greek architects established the main design templates, Roman architects established the basic engineering prototypes. Thanks to their mastery of the arch, vault and dome, they set the standard for most types of monumental architecture.
Their example was followed closely in Byzantine art Hagia Sophia , in medieval Russian architecture the onion domes of St Basil's Cathedral, Moscow , in Renaissance architecture Florence Cathedral by the likes of Fillippo Brunelleschi - for more about Roman influence on the Florentine duomo see: Florence Cathedral, Brunelleschi and Renaissance - Andrea Palladio and others, and Baroque architecture St Paul's Cathedral , and inspired Neoclassical architecture around the world.
In addition, Roman bridges, aqueducts and roads became the models for later architects and engineers throughout the world. Famous Roman Buildings.
Terra sigillata vessels from Arretium modern Arezzo, Italyknown as Arretine ware, were renowned for their relief decoration, which was typically produced using stamps of different figures and Spectacle In Roman Culture Essay So important where the bestiarii' s contribution, that when butcher meat became prohibitively expensive, Emperor Caligula ordered that all of Rome's prisoners "be devoured" by the bestiarii 's packs of starving animals. Spectacle In Roman Culture Essay you are in possession of this revolutionary secret of science, why not Expository Essay On Anne Frank it and be hailed as the new Newton?