Colosseum Vs The Pantheon: The Flavian Amphitheatre And Pantheon (Essay Sample)

COLOSSEUM AND THE PANTHEON Students Name Institution Colosseum and The pantheon The Colosseum, also referred as the Flavian Amphitheatre and Pantheon are among the most commonly known and reserved ancient historic buildings of classical architecture in the center of the city of Rome in Italy. The two buildings were built between the period of (AD 72-AD 80) and (27 BC – 14 AD) respectively, which are exactly the times when humanity had just received the symbols representing the Greek and Roman art together with the architecture masterpieces. Colosseum, oval in shape was built just east of the Roman forum is estimated to hold up to a maximum of 80, 000 people. The building was built and modified in the reign of three great emperors, funded by rich spoils from the Jewish temple. Emperor Vespasian started the construction which was then completed by his heir Titus and modified during the sovereignty of Domitian. The three emperors were then referred to as the Flavian Dynasty because of the building (Welch, 2007). The main purpose of the construction according to the emperors was to use it for entertainment purposes and pleasure which generally included animal hunt, public spectacles, cultural festivals and gladiatorial contests. The building comprised of large Corinthians column which was almost similar all through the building, each column comprising of historic statues in all the arches in the second and the third floors. The Colosseum was also unique in its own way as it was entirely free standing structure not built into the hillsides with eighty entrances, seventy six was of the entrances was used by ordinary persons, three used by the elite audience and one main entrance with special podiums in both the south and the north ends, which was used by the Emperor and his other top officials (Tan et al 2014). Architects also adopted problem solving method related to those in modern stadiums of which due to the large number of people it can accommodate, it was designed to make evacuation was also made quickly. Unlike the Colosseum which was used for entertainment and pleasures the Pantheon was architecturally designed as a temple of the Greek goddess known as Athena and generally used as treasury (Marder et al 2015). The Pantheon comprised of three types of columns, Doric, Ionic and Corinthian which were the common ones while building public places during that era making it slightly different from the Colosseum which was built using one similar column almost all throughout (Williams, 2017). The structure was built in three marble stages, with marble covering a larger part on the outer side of the building. White marble was used in the whole architecture work, targeting its impact on the sun, of which the north side of the Pantheon became grey and the south side became goldish making it more appealing. In contrast with the Colosseum amphitheater which as mentioned before, comprised of an arena at the center and eighty numbered entrances the Pantheon has only several entrances consisting of inner dif...