What was the Colosseum Built From?
The main walls of the Colosseum were built from travertine stone, a hard white limestone quarried in Tivoli 35km from Rome. The internals radial walls were constructed from tufa, a brown volcanic rock that was taken from the old city walls. These walls were then faced with plaster and painted in a variety of colours. The initial colour scheme was quite bright with internal passageways painted black, yellow or red. Marble was also used to face the cavea or seating areas and as some of the lower flooring. The upper floors were covered with opus spicatum, a herringbone pattern of brickwork. The Foundations of the Colosseum Because of the marshy nature of the terrain the Colosseum occupied, the foundations made full use of Roman engineering to support its massive structure. • Engineers dug 6m below the bottom of the lake that used to occupy the site and then a further 4m into the clay subsoil until they had an oval shaped ditch, 50m wide and 200m long. • The ditch was then lined with brick
