by a wall distinguished by the name of _podium_; although such appellation, perhaps, rather belongs to merely the upper part of it, forming the parapet, or balcony, before the first or lowermost seats, nearest to the arena. The arena, therefore, was no more than an open oval court, surrounded by a wall about fifteen feet high; a height considered necessary, in order to render the spectators perfectly secure from the attacks of wild beasts. There were four principal entrances leading into the arena; two at the ends of each axis or diameter of it, to which as many passages led directly from the exterior of the building; besides secondary ones, intervening between them, and communicating with the corridors beneath the seats on the podium. The wall or enclosure of the arena is supposed to have been faced with marble, more or less sumptuous; besides which, there appears to have been, in some instances at least, a sort of net-work affixed to the top of the podium, consisting of railing, or rather open trellis-work of metal. As a further defence, ditches, called _euripi_, sometimes surrounded the arena. The term podium was also applied to the terrace, or gallery itself, immediately above the arena, which was no wider than to be capable of containing two, or at the most, three ranges of moveable seats, or chairs. This, as being by far the best situation for distinctly viewing the sports in the arena, and also more commodiously accessible than the seats higher up, was the place set apart for senators and other persons of distinction, such as foreign ambassadors; and it was here, also, that the emperor himself used to sit, in an elevated place, called _suggestus_ or _cubiculum_, and likewise the person who exhibited the games on a place elevated like a pulpit or tribunal (_editoris tribunal_). Above the podium were the _gradus_, or seats of the other spectators, which were divided into _maeniana_, or stories. The first _maenianum_, consisting of fourteen rows of stone or marble seats, was appropriated to the equestrian order. The seats appropriated to the senators and equites were covered with cushions, which were first used in the time of Caligula. Then, after an interval or space, termed a _praecinctio_, and forming a continued landing-place from the several staircases in it, succeeded the second maenianum, where were the seats called _popularia_, for the third class of spectators, or the populus. Behind this was the second praecinctio, bounded by a rather high wall; above which was the third maenianum, where there were only wooden benches for the _pullati_, or common people. The next and last division, namely, that in the highest part of the building, consisted of a colonnade, or gallery, where females were allowed to witness the spectacles of the amphitheatre, but some parts of it were also occupied by the pullati. Each maenianum was not only divided from the other by the praecinctio, but was intersected