_Of the_ ROMAN AMPHITHEATRE _at_ Dorchester. [Sidenote: TAB. LXI. XCVII.] There was no kind of civil edifice, or public work, more frequent among the Romans, in Italy or the conquered provinces, than such as related to sports and games; for that brave and wise people both judged and found that method well calculated to bring over the nations to their own language and customs, being agreeable contrivances that seemed rather pleasure and delight than compulsion. Such were theatres, circs, amphitheatres, _stadia_, and the like. There were three amphitheatres in the city of Rome; that of Vespasian, the Castrense, and of Statilius Taurus: and, though we find them not so particularly taken notice of elsewhere in historians, yet we behold the things themselves, whose immense bulk and weighty materials have generally so long out-faced time and weather. We may affirm, there was scarce any colony or free city, of considerable note, in their extensive empire, that wanted these places of public pastime; and scarce any province now, where their footsteps at least are not visible, and many almost intire, particularly what we are now treating upon, amphitheatres: yet I believe it will appear a novelty to most people, when we shall talk of such curious antiquities in Britain. But since this time twelve-months, I have seen three, one at Silchester, another at Richborough castle in Kent, and this at Dorchester in Dorsetshire. I have been told of one with six tire of seats, three mile off Redruth in Cornwall. Sir Christopher Wren is the first person that I know of who gave this hint of inquiry, in discovering this, many years ago, in his journeys to the isle of Portland, when he began to build St. Paul’s cathedral. Great pity it is that he did not take an exact description of it at that time, when in greater perfection, before the gallows were removed hither by an unlucky humour of the sheriff; since when the parapet at top is on that side much beaten down, by the trampling of men and horses at executions; but especially because his great skill might have done it exact justice, and by means of his pen it might have shared in the duration of his works. In defect of such illustration, I hope the reader will accept of my mean endeavours to preserve so valuable a piece of architecture, which, notwithstanding the damage above mentioned, and that the _area_ of it has been ploughed up these many years, will still give a spectator a fine notion in the structures of this sort abroad, deservedly the admiration of travellers; and will present a person of understanding, the pleasure of observing the noble and great genius of the Romans in every production of their hands. Nor does the meanness of its materials debase, but rather inhance, its value and its art; for, though less costly and lasting than stone and marble, of which others are generally built, yet for the same reason less liable to rapine, and the covetous humour of such as plunder them