Plank Road: Merida

Merida is overwhelming, it is loaded with incredible Roman ruins as well as Visigothic artifacts and a Moorish alcazaba. We followed an excellent 11.5 km walking tour that is in our Extremadura walking book, but we spent so much time looking at ruins and combing through the museum, that it took us eight hours to finish the walk.

We started out at the wonderful amphitheatre which was inaugurated in 8 BC. Amphitheatres were used to stage the gruesome forms of entertainment that appealed to the Romans. There were animal fights, fights between gladiators and animals and fights between gladiators. The Spanish tend to bombard the visitor with information, which is really great. There are small information boards everywhere and quite a few had descriptions in English as well.

The floor contains a large cross-shaped ditch, archaeologists believe it was likely boarded over, but was used to store the animal cages and stage props. There are some interesting rooms off of the long passageways that lead into the arena. They may have been used by the gladiators or the wild animals may have been kept in these rooms.

We then visited the theatre which is very close to the amphitheatre, the theatre was inaugurated sometime between the 16 and 15 BC. The theatre is spectacular, it has a stunning stage facade which was put up in 105 AD, other alterations continued between 333 and 335.

The columns of the facade are of blue tinged marble which sat on white bases, the Corinthian capitals are also white. The architrave above is decorated with egg and dart and other lavish decoration.

Between the columns were huge marble statues of Ceres, Pluto and Proserpine as well as several statues that were likely the emperor and his relatives. The statues sitting in the facade are all reproductions, the originals, many sans heads, are in the museum. This was quite the complex, behind the theatre, there was a peristyle courtyard and porticos.

As the Christians viewed theatrical performances as immoral, the theatre was abandoned, fell into ruin and filled with earth. Only the upper section of seating was visible until archaeological excavation began in 1910.

We then moved on to the National Museum of Roman Art. This is an excellent museum with outstanding displays in a wonderful brick building. The collection is great, they have unearthed just about everything imaginable. We will post some photos of just a few of the great finds in this museum.

We will have to continue with Merida in tomorrow’s blog as we are done-in for the day and there is too much to deal with in one blog post.

Amphitheatre