Theatre of Marcellus

The Theatre of Marcellus is an ancient Roman theatre south of the Capitoline Hill, completed in 13 BC under Augustus and dedicated to his nephew Marcellus, who had died ten years earlier. With around 15,000 seats it was Rome's largest stone theatre and the model for the Colosseum, whose tiered arcaded facade is borrowed almost directly from it. In the Middle Ages the Pierleoni family fortified the structure; in the 16th century Baldassare Peruzzi converted the upper level into a Renaissance palace for the Orsini, still inhabited today. Visit the exterior with the adjoining temples of Apollo Sosianus.