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LOCRI EPIZEPHYRII



Salvatore La Rosa
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THE THEATRE
     
  By clicking on any image of this page you'll gain access to the Photo Section of the Theatre  
     
 

The theatre of Locri Epizephyrii dates back to the IV century b.C. and was modified substantially during the Roman age. During the Greek age it was used both for theater performances and for general meetings of the city population.

In origin it had a capacity of 4500 spectators but later on, during the Roman age, the capacity has been decreased to allow performances like gladiator clashes and fights of men vs. animals.

Cavea and portion of the Orchestra
CAVEA AND PART OF THE ORCHESTRA
Click on the image to view the Photo Section of the Theatre

 
 


As it was the custom for the Greek world, also the Locrian theatre was build along the natural slope of a hill, in an area characterized by an extraordinary acoustics, with the cavea facing the sea. Its remains (which can be visited in the modern Pirettina district) were brought to light by prof. Paolo Enrico Arias in 1940 although the archaeological excavation was completed only in 1957 by Alfonso De Franciscis.

Still nowadays, of the entire structure, are clearly identifiable its three main areas: the orchestra, the skene (with proskenion and paraskenia) and the cavea; the latter divided into five areas separated from each other by four stairways.

 
  Stage and Orchestra
STAGE AND ORCHESTRA
Click on the image to view the Photo Section of the Theatre

The whole structure is made out of a sandstone known as ammollis (term derived from the vulgarization of the Byzantine Greek word ammolithos, that literally means "stone made of sand": ammos = sand and lithos = stone), a stone typical of this area.

In contact with atmospheric agents, this very friable stone is subject to a progressive deterioration that, from the 1940s to nowadays, despite numerous attempts to intervene for the preservation of the monument, has produced irreparable damages to the cavea, whose sectors are currently almost uninterpretable.

 
     
 

Seaward, next to the theatre area, test excavations were carried out unearthing a small part of the old polis, separated from the theatre by a probable plateia, and organized following the regular grid plan; such discovery has led to the hypothesis that the regular grid plan of the polis, carefully studied in the area of Centocamere, was extended to the entire city up to the foot of the hills.

 
     
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