It is the biggest entertainment venue ever built, measuring approximately 600 m (1,968 ft) in length, 80 m (387 ft) in breadth and with a capacity of 250,000 spectators and more. According to the tradition, it was founded by Tarquinius Priscus in the valley between the Aventine and the Palatine Hills, after the drainage of Murcia Valley. This is said to be the area where the Rape of the Sabine Women took place and where Consus, the god protecting the harvests, was venerated.
Nowadays, the area is free except for a small part in the extremity towards Capena Gate.
It is possible to identify the ancient structure through the grass relieves and the earth ground (now at a higher level than that of the ancient arena) on which there is a long rise median in correspondence of the spina, the wall around which the chariots used to run.
At the beginning the circus had a wood structure; the first masonry structures were the starting gates, built along the west short side in 174 b.C.. The same year seven stone “eggs” were set on the spina to mark laps. Caesar intervention in 46 b.C. gave the circus its final form and in 33 b.C. Agrippa put seven tan dolphins with the same function of the eggs. Augustus ordered the construction, on the Palatine side, of the “Imperial Box” and an aedicule, a small temple to worship Gods protecting the games, and erected Ramsete Obelisk (23,7 m) on the spina. It came from Heliopolis in Egypt and in 1589 was removed and placed in Piazza del Popolo, where it is still situated.
Nowadays the last ruins of the circus are those of the curved side (at a considerable depth) near the small Medieval Tower belonging to Frangipane Family, between Via dei Cerchi and Capena Gate (Porta Capena).
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