Aphrodisias Stadium

About

Built in the later 1st century CE, this marble stadium ran 270 meters long with 30 tiers of seats for 30,000 spectators, closed at both ends unlike a typical Greek stadium. Its slightly elliptical sides sharpened every sightline. Inscribed seats reserved blocks for the goldsmiths' and tanners' guilds. Athletes still ran, jumped, wrestled, and threw the discus here in 117 CE.

What happened here

It was put up to be argued with. Public monuments carry an inscription at eye height naming who paid, what for, and by whose authority, because being read is the whole return on the investment. People meet at them, give directions by them, and shelter under them. Children climb them. The bronze fittings are stolen often enough that they are re-attached with lead. On anniversaries the base is garlanded and the local council makes a short speech nobody listens to. Monuments also date the town for you: a run of them along one street shows which families were rising in which decade, and which ones stopped. When a family falls out of favour, the name is chiselled out and the stone is quietly reused.

Sources

• https://www.aphrodisias.org/en/stadium
• https://www.worldhistory.org/image/3793/the-stadium-of-aphrodisias/

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