Ancient Stadium Disaster at Fidenae

We might think that the vast gatherings of people at sporting events as being a modern phenomenon: the largest crowd recorded at an enclosed stadium is considered to be the 173,850 (although unofficially thought to have been up to or over 200,000) present at the final match of the 1950 FIFA World Cup between Brazil and Uruguay at the Maracanã Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. But the Romans were more than capable of building infrastructure to host similarly vast gatherings, possibly even bigger with some estimates have the Circus Maximus capable of holding up to 250,000 people!

Getting into and out of such stadiums could be dangerous… indeed, just being part of the sea of humanity can be fatal, as modern disasters such as the Valley Parade Fire and Hillsborough highlight. And as the Romans were capable of building such stadiums/amphitheatres, many of them long-lasting - the Mediterranean is dotted with such surviving amphitheatres, not just the most famous Colosseum in Rome itself: Nimes (France), Pula (Croatia), El Jem (Tunisia), Pompeii (Italy), they too must have faced their fair share of stadium disasters.

One such recorded disaster involved a much less permanent structure than the likes of Colosseum: for in AD27, during the reign of the emperor Tiberius, both Tacitus, Annales IV.62-63 and Suetonius, Tiberius 40.1 preserve the story of a stadium disaster on a seemingly mind-boggling scale. The disaster was of suitable scale to see Tiberius emerge from his Capuan ‘exile’ in order to oversee the aftermath (Suetonius, Tib. 40.1).

It occurred in Fidenae, a Sabine town some five miles from Rome, but sunk to little more than a hamlet, enough for Horace to use its lowly state as a comparison for decline: Gabiis desertior atque Fidenis vicus – ‘Gabiis is more deserted than the village of Fidenae’ (Horace, Ep. I.11.7-8). This might make it all the more surprising that such a large-scale disaster could take place there. Horace was writing at least 20 years before this disaster at Fidenae, so unless the town had undergone some kind of Renaissance under Augustus and Tiberius, it seems a little strange that Fidenae would be the chosen site of such a seemingly enormous amphitheatre.

The man behind this venture was a freedman – a former slave – called Atilius. His background is unknown beyond that status, but he must have been at least moderately wealthy to think about undertaking the building of an amphitheatre – he could have inherited wealth from his previous owner or been significantly rewarded for his work under his owner. But his entrepreneurial career, and quite possibly his fortune, seems to have come to crashing halt in AD27 when his amphitheatre at Fidenae collapsed.

Tacitus gives little information about what the Fidenae amphitheatre looked like, aside from it being made of wood. This could indicate that it was nothing all that extraordinary about the construction (other than its seeming shoddiness). This saw the likes of the wooden amphitheatre depicted on Trajan’s Column used as something of a template for the digital reconstructions of what Atilius’ construction might have looked like (Napolitano (2015); Napolitano and Monce (2018)). With Tacitus regarding the tragedy as ‘unexpected’, does that suggest that there was no obvious instability in this kind of wooden structure? (Tacitus, Ann. IV.62.) This also seems to indicate that it was a spontaneous collapse, not due to longer term deterioration, which would fit with the idea that it was a new construction.

That leaves the cause of the collapse down to two options – issues with construction and/or actions on the day of the collapse. Atilius was accused of compromising on construction in more than one way. His amphitheatre was built on poor foundations (Tacitus, Ann. IV.62) – either the ground did not allow for them (and therefore the amphitheatre was poorly situated) or the supports were not sunk far enough into the ground to be stable, with the latter seeming more likely (Napolitano (2015) 14). This necessity for deep, strong foundations was clearly known by the Romans, with Vitrivius’ De Architectura, likely written half a century before the Fidenae disaster, able to speak at length on the importance of foundations…

“Durability will be assured when foundations are carried down to the solid ground and materials are wisely and liberally selected... Dig down to solid bottom, if it can be found, and lay them therein, going as deep as the magnitude of the proposed work seems to require”

Vitruvius, De Architectura I.3, 5

An inability, either by choice or necessity, to sink deep foundation columns was not the end of any building project, but such poor foundations placed greater importance and strain on the supports and connecting joints. And Tacitus mentions that at Fidenae these too were also not well secured, compounding one issue with another. As the entire venture was purely a money-making exercise by Atilius (Tacitus, Ann. IV.62), we can well imagine that construction was not only riddled with cost-cutting measures but also extremely rushed. It might even be that the Fidenae amphitheatre was opened for its first, disastrous show before it was actually finished!

There were clearly issues with construction then, but we can also intimate problems on the day of the disaster as well. Atilius’ games were taking place on the backdrop of a recent overturning of a ban on such spectacles by Tiberius, meaning that demand for such contests was through the roof. And due to Atilius building this amphitheatre to make as much money as possible, it is quite possible, even likely that when the Fidenae amphitheatre collapsed, it was more than “packed” (Tacitus, Ann. IV.62) – it was dangerously over-crowded.

But was it crowded enough to make the reported death toll believable? If even the lowest totals of dead are to believed – 20,000 by Suetonius, Tib. 40.1, while Tacitus, Ann. IV.63 has 50,000 “maimed or crushed to death.” For comparison, the Colosseum likely held up 50,000 spectators or up to 87,000 according to the Chronography of 354, so this wooden structure at Fidenae was of a large scale. Part of assessing the potential death toll at Fidenae involves asking whether the Romans of the first quarter of the 1^st century AD could build a wooden amphitheatre of that size. Digital reconstructions of what the Fidenae amphitheatre might have looked like and how big it might have been suggest that a seating capacity into the tens of thousands was certainly possible, with the average for such edifices approaching 30,000. (Napolitano (2015) 21; Napolitano and Monce (2018)). Could there have been another 20,000 packed in and/or milling about outside the amphitheatre having failed to gain entrance in order to be caught up in its collapse, exacerbating the death and injury toll?

Amphitheatre of Pompeii

While there may be room to doubt the number of fatalities listed by Suetonius, it is worth noting that even if we invoke the ‘rule of 10’, that still leaves perhaps 2,000 dead, which would still make Fidenae the deadliest stadium disaster ever known. Indeed, in mentioning the Fidenae disaster in connection with the reign of Tiberius, the fourth century compilation of chronological and calendrical texts known as the Chronography of 354 reports that 4,205 people died as a result.

The Roman Senate responded to the tragedy by tackling two of the core issues at play – cost and construction. In banning people with a fortune of less than 400,000 sesterces from hosting gladiator shows, they were essentially removing those they felt could not afford to host a proper even or build a proper amphitheatre without cutting corners in terms of quality and safety. We could also view such a law in socio-political terms. Do we really think there would have been such senatorial action if Atilius had been one of them? His being a freedman surely made it easier for the Senate to legislate against the lower orders. The Senate also required that all amphitheatres built in the future be erected on a sound foundation and inspected for quality of build by government officials. Tacitus would have it that the only other ‘good’ thing to come out of the Fidenae disaster was the outpouring public sympathy that followed, with “dressings and doctors were supplied to all comers” (Tacitus, Ann. IV.63) from all strata of society.

For his role in the disaster, Atilius himself faced banishment, although Tacitus is unclear about what this entailed. This could mean anything from a simple ban on involvement in hosting games again, a time-limited deportation from the vicinity of Rome or even a total exile, complete with loss of Roman citizenship. Whatever his punishment, being responsible for the deaths of hundreds and even several thousand Romans was worth of it. His drastic, cost-cutting combination of not being finished, built on poor foundations, constructed with substandard connections and quite possibly overcrowded due to the thirst for such contests engendered by Tiberius’ banning of such games made the Fidenae amphitheatre a disaster waiting to happen...

Primary Sources

Tacitus, Ann. IV.62-63

62 1 In the consulate of Marcus Licinius⁠ and Lucius Calpurnius,⁠ the casualties of some great wars were equalled by an unexpected disaster. It began and ended in a moment. A certain Atilius, of the freedman class, who had begun an amphitheatre at Fidena,⁠ in order to give a gladiatorial show, failed both to lay the foundation in solid ground and to secure the fastenings of the wooden structure above; the reason being that he had embarked on the enterprise, not from a superabundance of wealth nor to court the favours of his townsmen, but with an eye to sordid gain. The amateurs of such amusements, debarred from their pleasures under the reign of Tiberius, poured to the place, men and women, old and young, the stream swollen because the town lay near. This increased the gravity of the catastrophe, as the unwieldy fabric was packed when it collapsed, breaking inward or sagging outward, and precipitating and burying a vast crowd of human beings, intent on the spectacle or standing around. Those, indeed, whom the first moment of havoc had dashed to death, escaped torture, so far as was possible in such a fate: more to be pitied were those whose mutilated bodies life had not yet abandoned, who by day recognized their wives or their children by sight, and at night by their shrieks and moans. The news brought the absent to the scene — one lamenting a brother, one a kinsman, another his parents. Even those whose friends or relatives had left home for a different reason still felt the alarm, and, as it was not yet known whom the catastrophe had destroyed, the uncertainty gave wider range for fear.

63 1 When the fallen materials came to be removed, the watchers rushed to their dead, embra­cing them, kissing them, not rarely quarrelling over them, in cases where the features had been obliterated but a parity of form or age had led to mistaken identification. Fifty thousand persons⁠ were maimed or crushed to death in the disaster; and for the future it was provided by a decree of the senate that no one with a fortune less than four hundred thousand sesterces should present a gladiatorial display, and that no amphitheatre was to be built except on ground of tried solidity. Atilius was driven into banishment. It remains to be said that, on the morrow of the accident, the great houses were thrown open; dressings and doctors were supplied to all comers; and Rome throughout those days, however tragic her aspect, yet offered a parallel to the practice of the ancients, who were accustomed, after a stricken field, to relieve the wounded by their liberality and their care.

Suetonius, Tiberius 40.1 

After traversing Campania and dedicating the Capitolium at Capua and a temple to Augustus at Nola, which was the pretext he had given for his journey, he went to Capreae, particularly attracted to that island because it was accessible by only one small beach, being everywhere girt with sheer cliffs of great height and by deep water. But he was at once recalled by the constant entreaties of the people, because of a disaster at Fidenae, where more than twenty thousand spectators had perished through the collapse of the amphitheatre during a gladiatorial show. So he crossed to the mainland and made himself accessible to all, the more willingly because he had given orders on leaving the city that no one was to disturb him, and during the whole trip had repulsed those who tried to approach him.

Bibliography

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