Marcellus Theatre in Rome and its history
Set among the ruins of the Theater of Marcellus, one of the oldest buildings of ancient Rome, at the foot of the Capitoline Hill, there is an old noble palace, Palazzo Savelli Orsini. Let’s discover the secrets of this prestigious apartment.
From the Middle Ages onwards it has undergone various vicissitudes and various changes of ownership: it was bought by the Fabi called di Pescheria and then by the Pierleoni. In the fourteenth century it became the property of the Savellis who commissioned Baldassarre Peruzzi to build the palace. In the eighteenth century the Orsini dukes of Gravina became owners who, through some works, gave it the shape we know today.
In the thirties of the twentieth century, some expropriations were carried out which had the aim of freeing additional houses that had formed in the arches. In the 1950s the building passed to Iris Origo, the author of “The war in Val d’Orcia, an Italian diary”.
Today the building is made up of various apartments. In the main, the master room includes three bedrooms, the great hall, the library, the dining room and a ballroom.
The other apartment has three bedrooms, a kitchen, two bathrooms, a dining room and a giant terrace of 75 square meters. Under the palace there are 431 square meters of cellars. The building was put up for sale in 2012 for 32 million euros.
The majestic theater of Marcellus, largely still preserved, is the only ancient theater left in Rome. Raised in the southern area of the Campo Marzio, between the Tiber and the Capitoline Hill, it was requested by Caesar and continued by Augustus.
Another curiosity: it served as a model for the construction of the Colosseum. This building sets the pattern of the classical Roman theater, in which the cavea rests on masonry structures and not on a natural slope, as in the Greek theater.
The sobriety of the façade structure made it a reference model for every future Roman theater and amphitheater.
The building was erected in Campo Marzio, in the place that tradition had consecrated to scenic representations.The project was started by Julius Caesar, who expropriated the area for a large stretch, demolishing the existing buildings, and as mentioned it was taken over by Augustus, with new expropriations to expand the surface and erect a larger building.
Probably completed as early as 17 BC. C, the Theater of Marcellus was dedicated in 13 or 11 BC. in memory of Marcellus, nephew of the emperor, destined for succession, but who died in Baia in 27 BC. C.
Restored by Vespasiano and Alessandro Severo, still in operation in the 4th century, it was later transformed into a fortress owned by the Pierleoni and Fabi families due to its elevated position near the Tiber.
In medieval times it was gradually occupied by small buildings and transformed into a fortified castle, initially owned by the Faffo or Fabi known as Pescheria (XII century) and then passed to the Pierleoni (XIV century) and then from the second half of the XIV century to the Savellis, who had Baldassarre Peruzzi renovate the building that still exists above the arches of the facade.
In the eighteenth century the Orsini dukes of Gravina became owners, until the expropriations of the thirties and the subsequent liberation works (1926-1932), with which the numerous shops and houses that occupied the arcades and the surrounding space were eliminated; at the same time the arches, then buried for about 4 m in height, were excavated. The restorations involved the consolidation of part of the internal arches, with brick spurs, and the reconstruction of part of the façade, with the resumption of the architectural scheme of the spur stone arches.
The Theater of Marcellus was a grandiose construction with a diameter of 130 m, in which the Roman-type theater was built in complete form. The semicircular cavea was on substructures in tuff blocks, in reticulated work and in brick, on which the white marble steps rested.
On the outside it was characterized by a triple-order travertine facade of which the lower two arches on pillars with Doric and Ionic half-columns are preserved. The arch keys of the lower floors were decorated with colossal marble theatrical masks, related to tragedy, comedy and satyric drama.
The scene, decorated with columns and statues of white and colored marble, was flanked by the two halls or three-nave parascens and completed at the back by a large apse erected against any flooding of the Tiber. 36 bronze vessels facilitated the acoustics. The theater was covered by a curtain, and had a capacity calculated at 15,000 seats, 20,000 in case of need.
