Page:Dictionary of Classical Antiquities (Seyffert, 1901).pdf/41

An amphitheatre was usually an oval building, surrounding an arēna of like shape, which sometimes, as at Rome and Capua, was a plank floor resting on deep underground walls, the spaces underneath containing cages and machinery for transformations. The exterior was formed of several arcades, one above the other, the lowest one admitting to a corridor, which ran round the building, and out of which staircases led up to the various rows of seats. In the Colosseum this first arcade is adorned with Doric, the second with Ionic, the third with Corinthian "engaged" columns; the fourth is a wall decorated with Corinthian pilasters, and pierced with windows (see Architecture, figs. 8–10).

Immediately round the arena ran a high, massive wall, with vaults for the animals and for other purposes. On it rested the pŏdium, protected by its height and by special contrivances from the wild beasts when lighting; here were the seats of honour, e.g. at Rome, those of the imperial family, the officers of state, and the Vestal Virgins. Above the podium rose the seats of other spectators in concentric rows, the lowest ones being for senators and magistrates, the next for knights, and the rest for citizens. Women sat in the highest part of the building, under a colonnade, parts of which were portioned off for the common people. The whole space for seats could be sheltered from sun and rain by an awning supported on masts, which were let into corbels of stone that jutted out of the upper circumference. The arena could also be laid under water for the exhibition of sea-fights, the so-called naumăchiæ (q.v.).

Amphitritē, daughter of Nereus and Doris, is the wife of Poseidōn and queen of the sea. Poseidon saw her dancing with the Nereids on the island of Naxos, and carried her off. According to another account she fled from him to Atlas, when the god's dolphin spied her out and brought her to him. In Homer she is not yet called Poseidon's wife, but a sea-goddess, who beats the billows against the rocks, and has the creatures of the deep in her keeping. Her son is the sea-god Trītōn. She had no separate worship. She is often represented with a net confining her hair, with crabs' claws on the crown of her head, being carried by Tritons, or by dolphins, and other marine animals, or drawn by them in a chariot of shells. As the Romans identified Poseidon with their Neptune, so they did Amphitrite with Salacia, a goddess of the salt waves.

Amphĭtry̌on. Son of Alcæus, grandson of Perseus, and king of Tīryns. His father’s brother, Elektry̌on, king of Mycēnæ, had occasion to go out on a war of vengeance against Pterelāüs, king of the Taphians and Teleboans in Acarnania and the neighbouring isles, whose sons had carried off his cattle, and have slain his own sons, all but young Licymnius. He left Amphitryon in charge of his kingdom, and betrothed to him his daughter Alcmēnē. On his return Amphitryon killed him, in quarrel or by accident, and, driven away by another uncle, Sthĕnĕlus, fled with his betrothed and her brother Licymnius to Creōn, king of Thebes, a brother of his mother Hippŏnŏmē, who purged him of blood-guilt, and promised, if he would first kill the Taumessian fox, to help him against Pterelaus; for Alcmene would not wed him till her brethren were avenged. Having rendered the fox harmless with the help of Cĕphălus (q.v.) he marched, accompanied by Creon, Cephalus, and other heroes, against the