The construction of this theatre was speedily followed by the erection of others. But all the Roman theatres which were built towards the close of the republic, and commencement of the empire, were formed, in most respects, on the model of the Greek theatre, both in their external plan and interior arrangement. They were oblong semicircular buildings, forming the half of an amphitheatre; and were thus rounded at one end, and terminated on the other by a long straight line. The interior was divided into three parts—1. The place for the spectators; 2. The orchestra; and, 3. The stage(584). 1. The universal passion of the Roman people for all sorts of exhibitions, rendered the places from which they were to view them a matter of competition and importance. Originally there were no seats in the theatres, and the senators stood promiscuously with the people; yet, such in those days was the reverence felt by the plebeians for their dignified superiors, that, notwithstanding their rage for spectacles, they never pushed before a senator(585). It was in the year 559, during the consulship of the elder Scipio Africanus with Sempronius Longus, that the former carried a law, by which separate places were assigned to the senators(586). This regulation was renewed from time to time, as circumstances of political confusion removed the line of distinction which had been drawn. Scipio lost much of his popularity by this aristocratic innovation, and is said to have severely repented of the share he had taken in it(587). By the law of Scipio, part of the orchestra, (which, in the Greek theatre, was occupied by the chorus,) was appropriated to the senators. The knights and plebeians, however, continued to sit promiscuously for more than 100 years longer; but at length, in 685, a regulation of the tribune, Roscius Otho, allotted to the knights, tribunes, and persons of a certain _census_, fourteen rows of circular benches immediately behind the orchestra. This was a still more unpopular measure than that introduced by the edict of Africanus. Otho, during the consulship of Cicero, having entered the theatre, was hissed by the multitude, while Roscius was acting one of his principal parts; but Cicero presently called them out to the temple of Bellona, where he delivered a harangue, which appeased their fury and reconciled them to the tribune(588). Henceforth the senators held undisputed possession of the orchestra; and the knights, with the better classes, retained the fourteen rows of seats immediately surrounding it.