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of actors increased,and the subjects
of plays diversified. Scenery and costume gained new importance.In
the fifth century BC the Peloponnesian Wars against the Persians
in the Aegean brought economic hardship, and interest in the
theatre began to decline. Less high-brow but cheering entertainment
in the form of comedies came to the rescue. With the additional
advantage of being cheaper to produce, although not so highly
regarded, comedies began to dominate ancient theatre.Just
as we do today, ancient audiences purchased tickets for the
theatre in the form of fired clay medallions bearing the motif
of a theatre mask. Popular interest in tragedy and comedy
during Hellenistic times declined in the Roman period due
both to changes in lifestyle and the cultural policy of the
state. So interest in literary plays increasingly made way
for a love of displays involving violence and bloodshed.
The most notorious new forms of public
entertainment in the Roman period were the gladiator fights
in which contestants fought to the death, fights between wild
animals and people, animal fights known as venationes, and
water displays. Gladiator fights became widespread in Anatolia
following the Roman conquest. For the most part prisoners
or slaves were forced to fight against one another or specially
trained gladiators to the death, and gladiators also fought
to the death against lions, tigers, leopards, bears and other
wild animals. Accounts of these games were sometimes
recorded in inscriptions at the city theatre, one of the best
examples being that at the theatre in Sagalassos. This inscription
tells us how a gladiator named Tertullus fought against lions,
panthers and bears brought from Africa, and defeated them.
That similar displays were held at the theatres of Selge,
Myra, Perge and Ephesus is evident from structural alterations
made to the theatres. Broad entrances for wild animals, and
high walls around the arena to protect the audience were built.
Water displays were particularly
popular during the 4th and 5th centuries AD, when the orchestra
would be filled with water. In the large pools so formed,
re-creations of historic sea battles using boats would take
place, and pretty girls would perform synchronised swimming
displays. Theatres in the cities of Myra, Ephesus, Nysa and
Hierapolis were paved with marble for this purpose, and had
plumbing for filling and emptying the orchestra.In Hellenistic
Anatolia, theatres were mainly built on hillsides, as we see
at Pergamum, Ephesus, Antiphellos, Limyra, Kyaneai, and Laodicea.
In many cases the Romans continued to use these, carrying
out repairs and alterations where necessary, as at Alabanda,
Kibyra, Ephesus, Miletus and Myra. When they constructed a
new theatre, however, they chose not a sloping but a flat
site, where they built semicircular theatres, such as we see
at Aspendos and Side.
The fundamental element of the theatre
was the orchestra where the plays and displays were performed,
and around this were the curving tiers of seats. The skene
or stage structure faced the audience behind the orchestra.
The oldest known surviving skene is that at Priene, and the
best preserved theatre façade is that of Aspendos.Ancient
theatres could accommodate between one thousand and forty
thousand people, audience sizes that even today are rarely
attained, but were common in those days. The theatres which
were the most important buildings in ancient cities from the
Hellenistic to the early Christian era went into decline for
around 1500 years, the result of the centuries of hostility
between paganism and Christianity. Early converts to the new
monotheistic faith were pitilessly used as material in the
savage displays which took place in theatres during the Roman
period. As a result theatres became symbols of the cruelty
and persecution suffered by Christians. The populace came
to hate them, sometimes to the point of vandalising them.
From the 5th century onwards amphitheatres gradually went
out of use, and in the 7th century were abandoned altogether.
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