THEATRE

(Yunanca köken — orijinale bakınız.) In Architecture, a building appropriated to the representation of dramatic spectacles. The theatres of the Greeks and Romans display some of the most extraordinary specimens of their power in the arts. Bacchus has the reputation of being the inventor of them, which, after their temples, appear to have been the most important public edifices of those people. They seem to have been carried to perfection in the Grecian colonies at an earlier period than they were in the mother country. The first theatre of stone at Athens, called the theatre of Bacchus, was built in the time of Them is toc les; and as there seems little doubt that the A then i ans were the inventors of the drama as a regular scenic action, it is fair to presume that they were the first to regulate the form and proportions which nece ity and pleasure dictated in their arrangement. The subjoined diagram shows the general form of the Greek theatre, which differed but little from that »1of the Romans; and the instructions given by Vitruvius in the eighth chapter of his fifth book, as to the general outline of the plan, are as follows: "Whereas. • • "••• • « j in the Latin theatre the points of the four triangles touch the circumference,in the theatres of the Greeks the angles of three squares are substituted; ami the side of that square which is nearest to the place of the scene, at the '- -V\ A r'V- *\ points where it touches i--\lWjl\VVj?4 the circumference of the I...... --■-■>-: v.^;- •-".-•«< circle, is the boundary of the proscenium. A line £:: drawn parallel to this, at the extremity of the circle, will give the front of the scene. Through the centre of the orchestra, opposite tc the proscenium, another parallel line is drawn touching the circumference on the right and left; then, one foot of the compa es being fixed on the right-hand point, with a radius equal to the distance from the left point, describe a circle on the right-hand side of the proscenium, and, placing the foot of the compa es on the left-hand point, with the distance of the right-hand interval describe another circle on the left side of the proscenium. Thus describing it from three centres, the Greeks have a larger orchestra, and their scene is further rece ed. The pulpitum, which they call \oytiov, is le in width; wherefore among them the tragic and comic performers act upon the scene, the rest going through their parts in the orchestra." The ancient theatres were frequently used for the deliberations of the general a embly of the people on political matters, as we find from Tacilus and A us on i us in respect of the theatres at Anfioch and Athens. Notwithstanding the use of those buildings in later times as quarries freely used by the inhabitants of the cities in which they stood, there are still considerable ruins at Ephesus, A lab and a, Teos, Smyrna, Hieropolis, Cyzicus, Alinda, Magnesia, Laodicea, Myla a, Sardis, Miletus^ Str a to nice a, Tel me us, Jasus, and Patara, all in Asia Minor; in Sicily, at Catana, Taurominium, Syracuse, Argyrium, and Segesta. In Greece, ruins are still extant at Athens, Sparta, in the island of Eglna, at Epidaurus, and Megalopolis. According to Pausanius, that at Epidaurus, built by Polycletus, surpa ed all the other theatres of Greece in its beauty and proportions; but in grandeur and magnificence the Roman theatres far surpa ed those of the Greeks; nor is this surprising, considering the population the former had to accommodate compared with that of the latter. For a very considerable period the theatres of Rome, like those of the Etruscans, were of wood; and Pompey, on his return from the war against Mithridates, was the first who constructed one of stone. This must have been of large dimensions, in- [s. 1250]