Argos (Argos)

ARGOS (Argos), ancient Argolis, modern Greece.

COORDINTES: 37º37’53.65’’N // 22º43’40.47’’E

TIPOLOGY: Greek theatre.

DATE: III B.C.

TRANSFORMATIONS: II A.D.

CAPACITY: 20.000 spectators.

CAVEA: Facing east. It´s far for completing a semicircle, so it was built extending up, radius maximum of cavea is 77,28 m. Greek cavea had two maeniana, ima cavea with 49 rows of seats in 4 cunei and summa with 37 rows of seats in 4 cunei. In roman times cavea was transformed in 4 maeniana, with 13, 41, 11 and 17 rows of seat, respectively from bottom to top, with 4,6,2 and 2 cunei respectively.

ORCHESTRA: 14,5 m. diameter., 26m. including euripus.

STAGE BUILDING: Greek stage building was 6 m. width. Roman pulpitum was 35x5,6 m. and 1,20 m. high.

LOCATION: In Larissa hill, south-west from modern city.

MY BEDIDE TABLE: Moretti, Jean-Charles; “Théâtres d’Argos”. Paris, École française d’Athenes, 1993. // Lange, Judith; Bosnakis, Dimitris; “Ancient theatres”. Athens, Itanos, 1996. // Maximos, Platon; “Ancient Hellenic theatres”. Athens, 1998. // Maximos, Platon; “Fair competition: ancient stadia – ancient theatres”, Athens,  , 2004. // Mee, Christopher; Spawforth, Anthony; “Greece. Oxford archeological guides”. Oxford University Press, 2001. // Arias, Paolo Enrico; “Il teatro greco fuori di Atene”. Firenze, G.C. Sansoni, 1934. // Cailler, Pierre; Cailler, Diky; Bettex, Ivan; “Les Théatres gréco-romains de Grèce”. Laussane. Style. 1966. // Sear, Frank; “Roman theatres: an architectural study”. Oxford University Press, 2006. // Ciancio Rossetto, Paola; Giuseppina Pisani Sartorio (eds); “Teatri Greci e Romani: alle origini del linguaggio rappresentato”. Rome: SEAT, 1995.

OUT OF PRINT: Argos has five ancient theatrical structures, the the big ancient Greek theatre is one of my favourite ancient theatres. When I visited it I was a bit hypnotized, I was not conscious about the time I spent there. I sat down in the last row, in the upper cavea and could see the modern city in front of me, from the ancient theatre. It was strange, I could feel like a frontier between the theatre and the modern city, like it was two different layers, overlapping, coexisting in the same space but at the same time, independent, autonomous, indifferent to each other... it seemed that Greek Gods, in modern times, had given a respite to humans and had decided no to interfere more in earthly affairs, although, indeed, from the ancient theatre of Argos they still observe our madness... our unjustifiable reluctance life, lamenting a time where the theatre made them visible, made them close to men, made them imperfect, capricious, earthly.