The amphitheater was preserved even with the appearance in the 17th century. a new type of tiered (rank) theater designed for staging opera performances. The opera demanded good acoustics, optics and a larger capacity from the auditorium. This task was performed by tiers of hinged balconies, they increased the number of seats for the audience at the same area of ​​the hall and served as a sound resonator. In the rank theater, the seats began to be divided into stalls (in which the audience originally stood), an amphitheater and a balcony from a number of tiers, later divided by partitions into boxes (Italian type of theater) or in the form of continuous galleries (French type). The last tier of the theatrical balcony differed from the previous ones in that it was an amphitheater, divided by longitudinal and transverse aisles. So there were places for the unprivileged public, colloquially, the so-called. gallery. This type of theater gained worldwide distribution (Milan’s La Scala, 1776, London’s Covent Garden, 1732, the building of the Paris Opera, 1861-1875).With the differentiation of theatrical genres into musical and dramatic ones, a German, or sectoral, more democratic type of theater hall appeared. The hall of the First Drama Theater in Berlin, 1765, one of the first European drama theaters, was rectangular, had no balconies and consisted of one amphitheater. Due to the small capacity (800 people), this type of theater was not widely used. In 1821, the architects of the Berlin New Drama Theater K.F. Schinkel and G. Semper tried to reform the rank theater and return to the ancient form of the theater. The auditorium with a shallow stage and a wide proscenium consisted of a small semicircular parterre and an antique amphitheater with radial passages, ending with an antique colonnade. Such a hall provided all spectators with equal opportunities to see and hear. In 1913, the Berlin Bolshoi Drama Theater with an open stage was built according to the same type (architect H. Pelzig).

The French architect K.N. Ledoux, the founder of the Empire style, tried to return to the type of the ancient theater when designing the theater in Besançon. He moved away from the type of tiered theater, replacing the traditional tiers and boxes with semicircular amphitheater benches, and for the first time placing chairs in the stalls. True, the Ledoux project was an episode in the history of French theatrical architecture, the apogee of which was the magnificent pseudo-Baroque building of the Paris Opera (architect J. Garnier, 1861-1875).In Russia, since the era of Peter the Great’s reforms, a tiered type of theater has developed, predominantly Italian (the largest domestic theaters: the Alexandrinsky in St. Petersburg, the Bolshoi and Maly in Moscow, the Odessa Opera and Ballet Theater, etc.). In home fortress theaters of the 18th century. both the French type of tiered theater (Kuskovo) and the Italian type (Arkhangelskoye) developed. The view of the open palace theater is represented by an amphitheater in Pavlovsk, 1793. In Russia, a hall in the form of an ancient amphitheater has been preserved only in the Hermitage Theater of the old Winter Palace (architect J. Quarenghi, 1784).

At the beginning of the 20th century in Europe, the types of amphitheater or auditorium (an amphitheater with 1-2 tiers of balconies) halls revived. The attempts to reform the theater hall are connected with the evolution of the stage. With the advent of the tiered theater, a deep stage-box appeared, later there were attempts to make it either flat, as in the ancient theater, or with a proscenium leading into the auditorium, or the stage was completely abandoned and the action was transferred to the auditorium (the project of the functionalist architecture leader V. Groppius and director E. Piscator, Germany, 1920s). In the second half of the 20th century theater halls are being built with a stage surrounded by an amphitheater on four sides (Arena Stage in Washington, 1961), with an annular stage and a rotating amphitheater (Theater at Versailles, 1960).

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Over time, the appearance of the amphitheaters changed. For example, the external staircases that provided access to the public in early amphitheaters such as the amphitheater in Pompeii were later removed inside, and the facade was decorated with arches, semi-columns and statues. Such are the amphitheaters built approximately from the turn of the old and new eras and later – the Colosseum, the amphitheaters in El Jem, Verona, Pula, Nimes and others.

The arena (from the Latin “arena” – “sand”) of the amphitheater was an elliptical surface sprinkled with sand with approximate dimensions of 65–80´35–50 m. , however, they were necessary for the solemn procession (pomp) and the persecution of animals (venatio). In most amphitheaters, the arena was not located directly on the ground, but on a special wooden platform. Under the arena, there was a whole complex of separate rooms and passages, called the hypogeum.There were warehouses with scenery and weapons, dressing rooms, wild animals and their attendants were housed, there were also elevators on which the participants of the performances were lifted for their more spectacular appearance in the arena (see below for the design of elevators using the example of the Colosseum). In addition to the underground hypogeum complex, behind the high wall of the podium there was a number of rooms, some of which had access to the arena. This gallery, going around the arena, was called the punishment cell. Usually the punishment cell carried only an additional function, but in amphitheaters without an underground floor, the punishment cell served as a hypogeum.

Caligula and Nero at magnificent games showed a colored arena – “red lead and mountain greens” were poured over the sand, as a result of which the arena acquired a red or green color. These colors reflected the passions of the two parties of fans of chariot races in the circus – “Red” and “Green”.

Sometimes for performances on a mythological theme, animal hunts or theatrical executions in the arena, a landscape was erected from mountains, trees and buildings. In some amphitheaters, including the Colosseum before the construction of the hypogeum, special pools were made under the arena, designed to be filled with water. During most of the usual performances, they were covered with plank flooring. Pools of water were intended to represent mythological subjects and to hunt sea and river “monsters” (crocodiles and hippos). Sometimes they also held mini-naumachias with the participation of small boats and ship models.However, the arena was too small for real naumachia, and they were arranged on natural or artificial lakes.

To protect spectators from wild animals and gladiators, the arena was surrounded by a high wall (from 2.2 to 4 m). However, some animals from the cat family could take this height. Therefore, during performances with them, the height of the podium wall was additionally increased with a stretched net or poles with a net stretched between them were installed in the arena at a distance of 2 to 4 m in front of the wall. The latter option was preferable: on the one hand, the animals could not even approach the wall of the podium, and on the other, there was no possibility that any action would take place right next to the wall of the podium in an area invisible to some.

To protect against bad weather or the bright sun, a mirmillon awning was stretched over the stands of the amphitheater. Velarius was a strip of fabric attached to special masts. Depending on the position of the sun, it was moved, involving professional sailors for this.
The seats in the amphitheater (loka, kavea) were organized in such a way as to emphasize the social hierarchy of society. For the first time, senators received seats separate from the people at the games of 194 BC. Then it gave rise to a lot of talk: some supported such a division, others fiercely criticized, accusing the senators of excessive pride. In the end, the side of the latter was taken by Scipio Africanus himself, who proposed this innovation. However

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At first, amphitheaters were wooden and temporary structures, like a modern racetrack. Yet they seem to have been of enormous size, as Tacitus mentions one in Fiden, during the reign of Tiberius, whose collapse is said to have caused the death or injury of 50,000 spectators. However, stone amphitheaters began to be built in an earlier period, the first of which was built in 31 BC. e. on the instructions of August.

The Flavian amphitheater in Rome, known as the Colosseum because of its large size, was started by Vespasian and finished by Titus in AD 80. It was the largest structure of its kind, and fortunately survived best. It spans about five acres and was able to accommodate 50,000 spectators. Its longest length is 612 feet and its largest width is 515 feet, the corresponding figures for Albert Hall in London-270 and 240. On the occasion of his dedication by Titus, 5,000 wild animals were killed in the arena, the games lasted almost a hundred days.

The appearance of the Colosseum is about 160 feet in height and consists of three rows of columns, Doric, Ionian and Corinthian, and, above all, a number of Corinthian pilasters. Between the columns are arches that form open galleries throughout the building, and between each additional pilaster of the upper tier-window. In addition to the podium, there were three tiers or seat stories corresponding to external stories. The first of them was supposed to contain 24 rows of seats, and the second-1

The appearance of the Colosseum is about 160 feet in height and consists of three rows of columns, Doric, Ionian and Corinthian, and, above all, a number of Corinthian pilasters. Between the columns are arches that form open galleries throughout the building, and between each additional pilaster of the upper tier-window. In addition to the podium, there were three tiers or seat stories corresponding to external stories. The first of them was supposed to contain 24 rows of seats, and the second-16. They were separated by a high wall from the third floor, where the population lived. The podium was the galleries surrounding the arena in which the emperor, senators and vestals had seats.

The building was covered with a temporary awning or wooden roof called a velarium. The open space in the center of the amphitheater was called the arena, which means sand in Latin, because during performances it was covered with sand or sawdust.

The taste for excitement from the amphitheater in Rome naturally spread throughout the provinces, and large amphitheaters were erected not only in the provincial cities of Italy, as in Capua, Verona, Pompeii, Pozzuoli, etc., but also as Arles, him and Frejus in France; in Italica, near Seville, in Spain; and at Circencester, Silchester, and Dorchester, in England.

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