ure with rich internal decoration. The most ancient
Thermae in Rome, of which extensive remains still exist, were those of
Caracalla, erected in A.D. 217, already referred to in connection with
the earliest use of the contrivance which foreshadowed the pendentive.
Rising from a lofty platform, the noble tepidarium was roofed in by
three fine intersecting vaults, and its walls were cased in marble.
With their supplementary buildings the baths covered a space some 110
yards square, and beneath them were many vaulted rooms for the
attendants on the bathers. Amongst their ruins were found the
masterpieces of sculpture known as the Farnese Hercules and the Farnese
Bull, but when they were first placed there, there is no evidence to
prove.

[Illustration: Temple of Vesta, Rome]

Larger and more imposing in appearance even than the Baths of Caracalla
were those of Diocletian, that were capable of accommodating more than
3000 bathers and were built about A.D. 303. The grand hall or tepidarium
and the barrel-vaulted entrance portico were most successfully converted
in the sixteenth century into the church of S. Maria degli Angeli by
Michael Angelo, and one of two circular structures that flanked the
encircling wall was later consecrated under the name of S. Bernardo, and
is still used as a place of worship.

Next in importance to the Thermae rank the Amphitheatres of the Roman
Empire, in which gladiatorial contests and other trials of skill took
place, and without which no town however small was considered complete.
Though their detail was almost exclusively borrowed from the
Greeks--tiers of arches resting on columns and surmounted by an
entablature rising one above the other--their architects managed to
impress on them a distinctive character of their own. Finest of all
still existing examples is the Flavian Amphitheatre, generally known as
the Coliseum at Rome, which occupies the site of the famous Golden
House of Nero, and was completed about A.D. 70. It is of elliptical
plan, measures some 612 by 515 feet, and was from 160 to 180 feet high.
It was capable of containing some 80,000 spectators, and was for a long
period the chief meeting-place of the Roman citizens. The exterior is
four stories high and consists of a series of three rows of arches, the
lowest with Doric, the second with Ionic, and the third with Corinthian
capitals, the last surmounted by a row of Corinthian pilasters, forming
a fourth story, which is supp