In 1703 it was again damaged by an earthquake, and soon afterwards Clement XI. destroyed the lower arches of the western side of the corridor, and used some of the stone to build the steps at the Port of Ripetta, on the Tiber. He employed other parts as a warehouse for saltpetre for the neighbouring manufactory of gunpowder, on the hill adjoining, near the church of S. Pietro in Vincoli, still indicated by the name of the street, and this manufactory continued in use until 1811. In 1728, Benedict XIII. consecrated the whole area, at the instigation of a Carmelite friar, Angelo Paoli. A small chapel was made under one of the archways, and dedicated to _S. Maria della Pietà_. In 1741, a hermit was appointed to reside here, but in the following year he was stabbed by an assassin, and although the wound did not prove fatal, the Pope ordered the closing of every ingress by gates locked and barred. About the same period, Leonardo da Porto Maurizio, a Minorite friar, drew immense congregations to his sermons in the Colosseum. In 1749, Benedict XIV. ordered the erection at his private expense of the central cross, and the fourteen stations of the _Via Crucis_, which remained until 1874, when they were removed for the ground to be excavated. In 1756, a grand mass was celebrated here by the Cardinal Vicar of Rome under Benedict, in the presence of a very numerous assembly. The same ceremony was repeated a few years afterwards under Clement XIII. The outer arcade on the south-western side of this colossal building was entirely destroyed in the middle ages by the Pontifical families, who used it as a stone-quarry for building their great palaces. This enables us to see more clearly the construction of the walls of the corridors and front of the three periods:— First, the arches on the ground-floor, built of travertine. Second, the first-floor, also of travertine, not long after the other. Third, the upper storey, of brick on the inner side, of the beginning of the third century. We also see the numerous holes left by the iron clamps with which the edges of the stones were bound together, according to a Roman fashion which has been in use from the time of Servius Tullius to the present time. On the north-eastern side the front is perfect, and we see the ornamental columns and cornices in the two lower storeys, and in the upper one the corbels for the masts to carry the awning, with holes in the cornice to let them pass through. One of the arches of the lower storey has been restored in the time of the Gordians, A.D. 220-238, and is a good example of the still good construction of that period, though not so good as that of the time of Titus and Vespasian[151].