Roman Theatre of Amman

Stand at the foot of the stone rows and look up. The seats rise steeply above you, tier after tier of pale limestone, worn smooth by centuries of feet. Behind you, car horns and the calls of street sellers drift across the plaza. In front of you, the hill itself seems to have been carved into a giant bowl. The stone is warm to the touch on a sunny day, and the air smells faintly of dust and coffee.

This is the Roman Theatre of Amman, and it sits in the heart of the old downtown, the area locals call al-Balad. The theatre was built in the second century, during the reign of the Roman emperor Antoninus Pius. At that time, the city was not called Amman at all. It was called Philadelphia, and it was a prosperous provincial city on the eastern edge of the Roman world.

That name has an older story. Long before the Romans, the settlement here was known as Rabbath Ammon, the chief city of the Ammonites, an ancient people of this region. After Alexander the Great, a Greek-speaking king of Egypt, Ptolemy the Second, renamed it in his own honour. His title was Philadelphus, which means one who loves his sibling. So the city of Philadelphia in the United States shares its name with ancient Amman.

Under Roman rule, Philadelphia belonged to a loose group of cities known as the Decapolis. The word simply means ten cities. These were towns with Greek and Roman culture, scattered across what is now Jordan, Syria, and northern Israel. Each one wanted the marks of a proper Roman city — a colonnaded street, temples, baths, and a theatre. This building was Philadelphia's statement that it belonged to that world.

Now look at how the theatre is built. The Romans often raised theatres on flat ground with heavy arches and vaults. Here, the builders took a smarter route. They cut the seating directly into the slope of the hill. The rock does much of the work of holding the rows up. It saved material, and it gave the audience a steep, clear view of the stage below.

The theatre could hold around six thousand people. The seating is divided into three main bands, one above another. In Roman custom, seating often followed social rank. The most important citizens sat closest to the stage, in the lower rows. Ordinary people climbed higher. If you walk up to the top rows, you will feel how steep it is — and you will understand why the view from there was considered the cheap seats.

Here is a detail many visitors miss. The theatre faces north. That was not an accident. In this climate, the afternoon sun can be fierce. By turning the seating away from the south, the builders kept the sun behind the audience for much of the day. The spectators could watch a performance without staring into the glare. It is a small piece of engineering for comfort, and it still works today.

The second surprise is the sound. Find the centre of the stage area, near the front of the orchestra, the half-circle of flat ground below the seats. Speak in a normal voice, or clap once. People standing high up in the rows can often hear you clearly. The curved shape of the seating carries the sound upward. Visitors still test it, and you will often hear a sudden clap or a laugh rising from below.

After the Roman period, the theatre slowly fell out of use. Earthquakes, weather, and time took their toll. Stones were taken for other buildings, and parts of the structure were buried. In the twentieth century, the theatre was excavated and restored. That is why some seats look sharp and new, while others are rounded and cracked. Look closely, and you can often tell the ancient blocks from the modern repairs.

The building is not only a ruin. The rooms tucked into the wings on either side of the stage now house two small museums. One focuses on Jordanian folklore and traditional life. The other shows traditional clothing, jewellery, and crafts. They are worth a short visit. Stepping from the open stone bowl into these cool, quiet rooms gives you a sense of how the theatre's spaces are still being used.

Next to the main theatre stands a much smaller building, the Odeon. It is a little roofed theatre, or once was, built for music and more intimate performances. It seated only a few hundred people. Together, the two buildings show that Roman Philadelphia had room for both large public shows and smaller gatherings. The plaza in front, now called the Hashemite Plaza, sits roughly where the city's public life once flowed.

From the upper rows, turn and look across the valley. On the hill opposite rises the Amman Citadel, the oldest part of the city. You may be able to make out the tall columns of the Temple of Hercules against the sky. Amman grew across many hills, and from here you can see how the old city filled the valley between them. Houses climb the slopes in every direction, in shades of white and sand.

The theatre is still used, from time to time, for concerts and festivals. Imagine these rows full again, the stone lit at night, music rising into the air. Now look down at the stage once more. Notice the families resting on the lower steps, the children running across the orchestra, the pigeons settling on warm stone. As you walk back into the plaza, listen to the city around you — and remember that people have gathered on this exact spot for nearly two thousand years.