Ludi scaenici vs. ludi circenses

ludi Romaniludi plebiiludi Apollinares ludi Megalenses ludi florales

FabulaFabula praetextaMimePantomimeAtellan farceCytherisLaberius

Tessera

Nero’s ludi maximi

Mosaic showing a comic actor playing a slave (Roman, 1st century CE)

Comic scene (2 women consult a sorceress; Roman, 1st century CE; from the ‘Villa of Cicero’, Pompeii

Mosaic from Pompeii showing Roman actors

Ivory statue of a tragic actor playing a woman

(Roman; late 2nd century CE)

Terracotta figure of a comic actor

Campania, 150 BCE

Reconstruction of Pompey’s theatre/temple complex (55 BCE)

You know all about the rest of the games, which hadn't even that amount of charm which less lavish games usually have: for the spectacle was so elaborate as to leave no room for cheerful enjoyment, and I think you need feel no regret at having missed it. For what is the pleasure of a procession of six hundred mules in the Clytemnestra, three thousand bowls in the Trojan Horse, or brightly coloured armour of infantry and cavalry in some battle? These things roused the admiration of the mob; to you they would have brought no delight.

Cicero to Marcus Marius

Theatre of Marcellus (11 BCE)

Porticus of Octavia, next to the theatre of Marcellus

Roman theatre, Orange, France

Roman theatre. Amman, Jordan

Theater ticket/tessera (100-200 CE)

The Fall of Icarus

(Roman wall painting, Pompeii, 1st century CE)

“Icarus, on the first try, fell next to Nero’s seat and splattered him with blood.”