Public Structures of the Roman Empire .

The Romans were great builders and engineers famous for their factories, roads, aqueducts and bridges, grand thermae and amphitheatres, theatres and temples.

The greatest surviving circular temple of antiquity, and in many respects the most important Roman building, is the Pantheon in Rome. It consists of rotunda about 142 feet in diameter surrounded by concrete walls 20 feet thick, in which are alternate circular and rectangular niches. Light is admitted through a central opening, or oculus, about 28 feet across, at the crown of the dome. In front is a porch with an inscription commemorating an earlier building of Marcus Agrippa (12 BC – AD 14) but built with the existing rotunda (AD 120 – 124) under the emperor Hadrian. The rotunda and dome are among the finest examples of Roman concrete work. The interior was lined with precious marbles, the coffers (decorative recessed panels) of the dome itself once was covered externally with bronze plates.

The largest and most important amphitheatre of Rome was the Colosseum, built by the emperors Vespanian, Titus, and Domitian in about AD 70 / 75 – 82. Covering six acres (2.4 hectares), it had seating for about 50, 000 spectators, and its 80 entrances were so arranged that the building could be cleared quickly. The whole is built of concrete, the exterior faced with travertine and the interior with precious marbles.

Other important amphitheatres are those at Verona, Italy; at Pula, Yugoslavia; and at Arles, France.

Imperial thermae were more than baths. They were immense establishments of great magnificence, with facilities for every gymnastic exercise and halls in which philosophers, poets, rhetoricians, and those who wished to hear them gathered.

The best preserved are the Baths of Caracalla (begun c.AD 217), which covered an area about 1, 000 feet square, and those of Diocletian (c. AD 298 – 306), with accommodation for 3, 200 bathers.

Vocabulary:

# to admit - допускати, приймати;

# opening - отвiр;

# grand thermae - грандiознi парiлки;

# inscription - надпис;

# alternate - змiнний; що чергується;

# porch - веранда, балкон;

# concrete - бетон;

# precious - дорогоцiнний;

# establishment - заклад;

# magnificence - велич;

# accommodation - розмiщення;

# recessed panels - панелi з нiшами.

The Pantheon, built as a temple in Rome about A.D. 126, still stands. This cutaway drawing shows the interior of the domed, circular building. Corinthian columns support the porch roof.