Reuse of Amphitheatres at Sabratha and Lepcis Magna as Domestic Spaces

Reuse of Amphitheatres at Sabratha and Lepcis Magna as Domestic Spaces

These diagrams depict the subdivision of amphitheatres in the North African cities of Sabratha (top) and Lepcis Magna (bottom) into domiciles for their subsequent reoccupation. In both cases, these changes were probably prompted by local circumstances such as fire or earthquake. Lepcis Magna experienced an earthquake in 365 CE, and these improvised dwellings were constructed afterwards somewhere in the early fifth century. As in the case of the temple of Isis at Baelo Claudia, Hispania, these were local circumstances, part of the evolution of these cities.

Anna Leone

Anna Leone, "The Vandal Period (429-534): Changing Townscapes," Changing Townscapes in North Africa from Late Antiquity to the Arab Conquest (Bari: Edipugia, 2007): 139

2007