Arena of Nîmes

Roman amphitheatre in Nîmes, France

The Arena of Nîmes is a Roman amphitheatre in Nîmes, southern France. Built around 100 CE, shortly after the Colosseum of Rome, it is one of the best preserved Roman amphitheatres in the world. Nowadays, the Arena of Nîmes is the site of two annual bullfights during the Feria de Nîmes, and it is also used for other public events like the reenactment of antiquity "The great Roman Games" and for concerts.

Roman amphitheatres first appeared in Southern Italy in the second century BCE and were specifically designed for putting on spectacular combats between gladiators or animal fights. This new type of construction took the form of two theatres set face to face with an oval arena which allowed everyone, wherever they were sitting, to see the spectacles being acted out in the sand covering below, without danger of missing anything. At its high point, in the first and second centuries, the Roman Empire was a prosperous, urbanised society. In the third century CE, this stability was shattered by crisis. The empire was torn apart by civil wars, the barbarians became more frightening and epidemics made the whole situation worse. As gladiatorial fighting was an urban phenomenon, it declined at the same time as the cities. From the fourth century, the city of Nîmes began to retract and strengthen its defences. The arcades of the amphitheatre were blocked up and the monument became an important part of the defence of Nîmes. A large number of people from the town took refuge inside the former amphitheatre that had now become a fortified castle. It suffered several sieges, but the amphitheatre has proved its very effective defence. In 725, Arabs from Spain annihilated the Visigoth kingdom by taking control of Nîmes. Thirty years later, they, in turn, were driven out by the Franks, who themselves finally settled in Nîmes. However, the city was now only a shadow of its former Roman self. It was not until the 12th century that a new expansion was to occur. As a sign of this renewal, in 1194, the Count of Toulouse authorised its vassals in Nîmes to build a new city wall, whose layout corresponded more or less to the boulevards of the town that we see today. At that time, the amphitheatre was still an important element in the town defence system. A real little neighbourhood grew up there, with its own churches of St Peter and St Martin. Gradually, over the course of the 14th century, the amphitheatre lost its military value but remained a residential quarter. Influenced by the ideas of the Renaissance, King Francis I wanted to get the amphitheatre back its ancient appearance, but all that was done at that time was to clear away the buildings from the first floor gallery. By the 18th century, there were still 150 houses inside the arena with hundreds of people living in them. The clearing of the monument began in 1786 when the houses cluttering it were demolished. Only two walled arcades with their medieval windows have been preserved, opposite the Palace of Justice, providing us with a reminder of that period. In the middle of the 19th century, the architect Henri Revoil completed the restoration of the monument. Since 1853, when the first bullfight took place, the public has once again been able to watch festivities, sporting events, entertainments and bullfights at regular intervals. The statue of Christian Montcouquiol, known as Nimeño II, stands at the entrance, called "Hero". In 1853, balloonist M. Louis Deschamps was killed during his 120th flight from the Arena of Nîmes. Bad weather had already forced the mayor to call off a parachute performance, but the balloon took off as planned and got caught in the bad weather. Deschamps was thrown from the basket and the balloon came down about half a mile further along.