Aphrodisias Bouleuterion
About
Aphrodisias's city council chamber, seating roughly 1,750 people and doubling as a concert odeon, was funded by Attalos son of Dometeinos around 200 CE, a generation-plus after Hadrian's death, let alone Trajan's. In 117 CE the site behind the Sebasteion where it stands had not yet been built up this way. It was later refurbished around 390 CE by the Roman governor of Caria.
What happened here
The doors stand open during a session, so the crowd outside can hear. Inside, the order of speaking is the order of rank, and a man's whole career is measured by how early his name is called. Members sit on tiered benches facing each other rather than a chair, which makes the room argumentative by design. Business is read out by a clerk: letters from governors, embassies waiting in the corridor, requests for temple money, permission for a town to build. Voting is done with the feet, one side of the room against the other. Nothing said inside leaves formally, and everything said inside is repeated by evening. In a provincial town the local council does the same work in a smaller room, and cares about it just as much.
Sources
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