Talk: Colosseum
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Why is this article called the Roman Colosseum? I cannot find any other well-known "Colossei", and even if there are, then this building still deserves to be on the Colosseum page, with references to these others. jheijmans
Have you seen The Coliseum? (Hint: it's in Nashville. Nashville is in Tennessee). ~~
I'm confused by this phrase " marble burned to make limestone". Burning marble does not make limestone. Marble is metamorphosed limestone; limestone that underwent tremendous pressure and heat in the earths crust. Burning it does not turn it back into limestone. Perhaps what is intended is "lime" for use in mortar? And anyway, the colosseum is made of travertine, not marble.
I know those comments are kind of old, but I wanted to add this...it should probably just be "Colosseum," or even Flavian Amphitheatre, but I guess no one calls it that anymore. Also, I wasn't sure about the burning marble sentence, so I left it in. All I know about the marble is that they removed it to build other things in the middle ages. Adam Bishop 05:48 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)
Temple in Jerusalem
I heard something on a TV documentary somewhere about the construction of the Colosseum having been financed by the sacking in 70 CE of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem. The timeline seems to allow for this possibility, but is there a citable source that can corroborate this assertion? - Knoodelhed (Su. 9/7/03 14:30 PDT)
I agree. How could this be established with a citable source? Through Annual Reports? But what's the point here? Responsible economic history? Subtexts and agendas: so often a sign of pseudohistory. Wetman 12:26, 21 Nov 2003 (UTC)
- From the documentary I saw, there is some carved stone. Before the new text, there were holes for bronze letters. Some epigraphist reconstructed the text as VESPASIANVS / AMPHITEATRU / EX MANIBVS, which allegedly means that Vespasian built the amphiteatre with the loot. -- Error 23:33, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Is the plural of "colosseum" collossea? Dysprosia 07:27, 15 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- There is only one Colosseum...the Flavian Amphitheatre. It's not really correct to call those other ones colosseums. Anyway, "colosseum" is an adjective (describing the statue of Nero). If you wanted to use it as a noun in Latin (meaning "those things that are colossal" I guess) you could say "colossea," but I doubt it would ever have been used that way. The plural of amphitheatrum is "amphitheatra," if that helps. (If you want to use it as an English noun the plural is just "colosseums" :)) Adam Bishop 19:48, 15 Mar 2004 (UTC)
I move that this article be moved to Colosseum. There is no other Colosseum (even if there is a copy of it in Tennessee), and the word Colosseum was coined in relation to this building. Even if it needs to be disambiguated from some other Colosseum, the correct form would be Coloesseum, Rome or Colosseum (Rome). Adam 08:22, 18 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Death penalty
"In recent years, the local authorities of Rome have ordered the lighting of the Colosseum to be lit all-night-long whenever a condemned to death penalty gets its sentence commuted or indulted."
Who can explain this to me? (It's the last sentence of the article.) Does this make sense? <KF> 03:57, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- "In recent years, the officials of Rome have ordered that the lights of the Colosseum should burn continuously throughout the night each time the death sentence of a condemned prisoner is commuted." That's what it's trying to mean: no idea if it's true. - Nunh-huh 04:03, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- Is there capital punishment in Italy? <KF> 05:10, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- I think not, and suspect that the officials of Rome are simply having their say about the rest of the world. - Nunh-huh 05:47, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- A recent example was the liberation of the two Simonas kidnapped in Iraq. -- Error 23:33, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)
who was the architect?
This is one of the most spectacular buildings built before the 20th century. Any information on who and how it was designed?
In the 20th century, can some architect office give an estimate of the number of engineers required to design something of this scale, with good old pen & paper? What about the construction? in 8 years?
-I haven't read anything in particular on this issue, but I know that Romans very rarely (or not actually) write down the architect on an inscription, but merely the one who donated the funds or the one who ordered it to be built.
For the Romans a mathematician was in much higher regard than a regular architect, or so I have been told. So I think it'll be hard to find out who designed it. Probably there will have been a team of architects with each one having their own specialty, and one supervisor. - EB
