The Theater of Marcellus is one of the most impressive surviving monuments of ancient Rome. Its construction began under Julius Caesar, who planned a grand stone theater to rival that of Pompey the Great. According to archaeologist Filippo Coarelli, Caesar likely only had time to clear the land before his assassination in 44 BCE.
The project was completed by Augustus as part of his transformation of the Campus Martius in the late first century BCE. The theater was dedicated to Augustus’ nephew and intended heir, Marcellus, who died prematurely in 23 BCE. Although construction was completed soon afterward, the building was not formally inaugurated until 13 BCE. Despite this, the theater was already in use during the Secular Games in 17 BCE (CIL VI.32323.157).
With a capacity of roughly 20,000 spectators, the Theater of Marcellus was the largest stone theater in Rome. By comparison, the nearby Theater of Pompey held around 18,000 people, while the Theater of Balbus accommodated about 12,000. These three venues stood close together in the Campus Martius, creating what historian Paul Roberts calls a kind of “theaterland” in this part of the city, where the crowds of theatergoers stimulated surrounding businesses that fed and entertained them.
The theater was built in the area of the Campus Martius known as the Circus Flaminius. Ancient writers report that earlier buildings had to be demolished to make room for it. Pliny the Elder mentions the destruction of the Temple of Pietas (Natural History, VIII.121), while Cassius Dio suggests another temple, likely dedicated to Diana, was also removed (Roman History, 43.49.3). According to Coarelli, construction of the theater may even have destroyed part of the curved edge of the Circus Flaminius, turning the area into an open piazza.
Architecturally, the Theater of Marcellus resembles the later Colosseum. Its exterior originally had three levels framed by columns in the three classical architectural orders: doric, ionic, and corinthian. Today only the lower two levels survive, since the upper portion was altered when Renaissance apartments were built within the structure. The theater originally stood about 32.6 meters high, of which roughly 20 meters remain.
Ancient sources record several events connected with the theater’s dedication. According to Cassius Dio, during the inaugural festival:
“The patrician boys, including his grandson Gaius, performed the equestrian exercise called ‘Troy,’ and six hundred wild beasts from Africa were slain.” (Roman History, 54.26.1)
The historian Suetonius provides a more humorous anecdote. He writes:
“At the opening of the games with which he dedicated the theater of Marcellus, it happened that the joints of his curule chair gave way and he fell on his back.” (Life of Augustus, 43.5)
After its dedication, references to the theater in ancient sources are surprisingly rare. We know that it was restored during the reigns of Vespasian (Suetonius, Vespasian, 19) and Alexander Severus (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus, 44), but little else is recorded about its use.
Like many Roman monuments, the theater was gradually repurposed by late antiquity. In the late fourth century, stone from the building was used to repair the nearby Pons Cestius.
During the Middle Ages the monument became part of a fortified complex. According to Amanda Claridge, the powerful Pierleoni family fortified the theater in the 11th and 12th centuries as part of their stronghold between Tiber Island and the Capitoline Hill.
In the 14th century the site passed to the Savelli family, who commissioned the Renaissance architect Baldassare Peruzzi to design the palace still visible today above the ancient arches. The property later came into the possession of the Orsini family in the 18th century.
Major changes occurred in the 20th century during the rule of Benito Mussolini. In an effort to “liberate” ancient monuments, fascist authorities demolished the crowded houses and shops that had grown up around the theater and built the new Via del Mare. For centuries the lower arches had been filled with shops, taverns, and storerooms, but these were cleared away and the surrounding ground excavated down to the ancient Roman paving.
Today the Theater of Marcellus stands as a remarkable example of how Roman monuments were reused and adapted over centuries. Its survival is due in large part to these later transformations, which preserved much of the ancient structure within the fabric of the medieval and Renaissance city.
Bibliography:
- Carley, Meaghan. “On Grief, Ruins, and the Theater of Marcellus.” The Paideia Institute, 2017. https://www.paideiainstitute.org/theater_of_marcellus
- Claridge, Amanda. Rome: An Oxford Archaeological Guide. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.
- Coarelli, Filippo. Rome and Environs: An Archaeological Guide. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014.
- Platner, Samuel. “Theatrum Marcelli.” In A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome (pp.513‑515). London: Oxford University Press, 1929. Retrieved from: https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/_Texts/PLATOP*/Theatrum_Marcelli.html
- Roberts, Paul. Ancient Rome in Fifty Monuments. London: Thames & Hudson, 2019.
Julius Caesar planned to build a theater (Suet. Caes. 44; Cass. Dio xliii. 49. 2; liii. 30. 5), and to make room for it he removed the temple of Pietas in the Forum Holitorium and other shrines and private houses (Plin. NH vii. 21 ; Cass. Dio xliii. 49. 3), but the building was not actually constructed by him but by Augustus, who found it necessary to purchase additional land from private owners at his own expense (Mon. Anc. iv. 22).
The theater was a memorial of Marcellus and dedicated in his name (Cass. Dio, Mon. Anc. locc. citt.; Liv. Epit. 138; Suet. Aug. 29; Plut. Marc. 30). In 17 B.C. the work of construction was so far advanced that part of the celebration of the ludi saeculares took place within the theatre (CIL vi. 32323. 157 ;1 EE viii. 233), but the dedication did not occur until 13 (Cass. Dio liv. 26. i). On this occasion magnificent games were held (Cass. Dio liii. 30. 6; liv. 26. I; Suet. Aug. 43). Augustus placed four remarkable marble columns from the house of Scaurus on the Palatine ‘in regia theatri ‘ (Asc. in Scaur. 45), but whether this was the middle door in the scaena, as was probably the case in the theater of Pompeius or one of the halls at the ends of the scaena (see below), is uncertain (LR 498; BC 1901, 56). Besides the ordinary form of the name, the theater was also called theatrum Marcellianum (Suet. Vesp. 9 ; Mart. ii. 29. 5; CIL vi. 33838 a).
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Vespasian restored the scaena (Suet. Vesp. 19), which had perhaps been injured when the Vitellians stormed the Capitol, and Alexander Severus is said to have intended to restore it again (Hist. Alex. Sev. 44), but of this nothing more is known. Martial mentions this theatre with that of Pompeius as one of the notable structures of the city (x. 51. 11); and parts of the ludi saeculares of Severus were celebrated in it, as in the games of Augustus (CIL vi. 32328, 33 ; EE viii. 271, 285). It is found on sundry inscriptions as an indication of location (Fast. Allif. Vail. a. d. xvi Kal. Sept., CIL i². 217, 240, Amit. a. d. xv Kal. Nov., 12. p. 245: Iano ad theatrum Marcelli; Urb. CIL i². 252, 339; vi. 9868: sagarius a theatro Marcelli; 10028; 33838 a: coactor a theatro Marcelliano); in Servius incidentally (Aen. vii. 607, cf. Jord. i. 2, 347); and in Reg. (Reg. IX).
Some of the travertine blocks used in the restoration of the pons Cestius in 370 A.D. were taken from this theatre (NS 1886, 159), which may perhaps indicate that the destruction of the building had begun by that time, although Petronius Maximus, prefect of the city, set up statues within it in 421, and one inscribed pedestal was found in situ in the eighth century by the compiler of the Einsiedeln Itinerary (CIL vi. 1650). Hulsen has shown (RPA i. 169-174; HCh 226 (S. Caeciliae de Monte Faffo, cf. 337 2) that the name templum Marcelli still clung to the ruins in 998, that the Fabii or Faffi were in possession of them as early as the middle of the twelfth century, and held them until the end of the thirteenth, when they were succeeded by the Savelli. It is very doubtful, on the other hand, whether the Pierleoni had any connection with the theatre. In 1368 it came into the possession of the Savelli family, and in 1712 into that of the Orsini. The present Palazzo was built by Baldassare Peruzzi for the Savelli in the early part of the sixteenth century, and stands upon the scaena and a large part of the cavea of the theatre (BC 1901, 52-70; 1914, 109; Lovatelli, Passeggiate nella Roma antica, Rome 1909, 53-88; LS iii. 7-8).
The theater is represented on fragments (28, 112) of the Marble Plan, and stands near the Tiber, on the north-west side of the Forum Holitorium. The stage is toward the river, and the main axis runs north- north-east and south-south-west. It was built of travertine for the most part, with opus reticulatum in the foundations and inner walls (AJA 1912, 393), covered on the inside-and perhaps partly on the outside-with stucco and marble. A little less than one-third of the semi-circular exterior is still standing in the Via del Teatro di Marcello. It was built with three series of open arcades, one above the other. Between the arches of the lowest arcade are half-columns of the Doric order, and above them is a Doric entablature with triglyphs and an attic, 1.20 metre high, with projections that form the bases of the half- columns of the second Ionic arcade. The entablature above these columns consists of an architrave of three projecting ledges, with a plain frieze and cornice. The original third arcade with Corinthian pilasters has been entirely destroyed and replaced with modern masonry. Thirteen piers, 3 metres wide and 2 thick, with their engaged columns, are still standing, and were till lately buried to about one-third of their height beneath the ground. Immediately within these piers was an ambulatory running round the cavea, from which spur walls were built on radial lines to support the tiers of seats. The construction of the walls, seats, etc., as well as of the exterior, seems to have been quite like that of the theater of Pompeius and that which was afterwards developed in the Colosseum. The arcades, ambulatories, and chambers between the open walls have now been cleared. The diameter of the theatre was about 150 metres, the scaena was about 80-9o metres long and 20 deep; and at each end of the scaena was an apsidal hall, about 25 by 15 metres, one of which may have been the regia (see above).
According to the Notitia, this theatre had 20500 loca, and if this is interpreted to mean running feet of seats, as is usual at present, it would accommodate from ten to fourteen thousand spectators (BC 1894, 320), but much doubt attaches to these estimates of seating capacity (in addition to literature cited see in general BC 1901, 65-70; HJ 515-519; LR 493-495; D’Esp. Mon. i. 36-38; ASA 88; ZA 231-236; Capitolium i. 529-534; ii. 594-600).
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Cite this page as: Darius Arya, The American Institute for Roman Culture, “Theatrum Marcelli (Theater of Marcellus),” Ancient Rome Live. Last modified 03/16/2026. https://ancientromelive.org/theatrum-marcelli-theater-of-marcellus/
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