Resurrecting ruins of a forlorn Roman theatre

Mainz / DPA

Where once 10,000 people gathered at a time, all chattering in Latin and guttural German dialects before watching live plays, only weeds now thrive. The ruins of Mainz’ 2,000-year-old theatre are neglected. Only a flimsy fence separates it from a railway station. Wooden benches built 15 years ago on the old stone are so rotten that they can’t be sat on any more.
Visitors could be forgiven for not realizing that the biggest Roman theatre north of the Alps once stood here. It had a stage 42 metres wide. The forlorn monument is an example of an ancient building that can’t pay its way in the modern world.
It was ordinary citizens – school children, students, citizen scientists and interns – who first excavated the theatre in 1999. “You couldn’t see anything of the theatre before that, there was a street on top of it,” says Hans Marg, president of Roemisches Mainz (Roman Mainz), a local history society.
But exposing the stone seating was only the start of the problems. If this were Asia or America or Australia, the citizens would die of pride to have Roman ruins, but in Mainz, Roman remains are fairly common. They are costly to keep up.
“We had no money,” says Marinanne Grosse, head of conservation of historical monuments in Mainz. There are just too many historic buildings in the region to look after, she adds. But now she’s determined to resurrect the theatre, step by step.
First will come a proper fence, then a first row of seats, then performances, then more benches, until at least 500 people can sit in the semi-circular area and watch open-air shows.
As to what could be performed in the theatre, “We’re pretty easy,” says Grosse. It could be anything from plays to dance evenings to open-air cinema showings. The director of Mainz’ Staatstheater, Markus Mueller, has already been down to look at the ruins to see what could be feasible.
The setting is “very challenging,” a spokeswoman for him says cautiously. The sandy ground – expensive to build on – is just the start of the problem. The trains passing through the adjacent station will also be very loud, she says. In fact, the train tracks run right through the theatre – exactly where the stage once stood.
“We still don’t know today how elevated the stage area was,” says Gerd Rupprecht, who many years ago was state archaeologist of Rheinland-Palatinate state. But he believes that those in the front rows would have had to look upwards. The whole theatre must be had tiers rising over several storeys, perhaps as high as the gabled roof of a nearby church.
“And there would have been an awning, like you see in today’s football stadiums,” says Rupprecht. Works by ancient playwrights would probably have been performed in the “monster theatre,” says Marion Wittier, director of the state archaeology department. “Unfortunately we don’t know exactly what that would have been in our region,” she adds.
Germania, the area around the Rhine river which includes parts of present-day Belgium and the Netherlands, was conquered by the Romans in the first century BC, when the empire stretched to include much of northern Europe, even reaching as far as the north of England.
Since Rome would have wanted Roman culture and ideas to be spread to the provinces to help consolidate its grip, it’s likely the stage would have played host to the major tragedies of the day.
And the theatre wasn’t just used for plays. Mogantiacum, as Mainz was known then, was a place of political gatherings for Germania and Gaul, an area of western Europe that included present-day France, Switzerland and northern Italy.
Once a year important dignitaries from the Roman province of Germania Superior all gathered together, and these meetings took place in Mainz’s theatre. “Fine speeches and sacrifices were made,” says Wittier. So it wouldn’t be historically inconsistent to use the theatre for community meetings.
When a citadel was built in the 16th century, the remains of the theatre were filled in or cleared away. It was only in 1884 when a railway line was built that the ruins of the theatre wall reappeared for the first time.
“But the railway builders won out over the archaeologists,” says Marg. The only honour for the theatre was that the station was named after it. There was renewed interest in 1914 when excavations began again, but that was quickly doused too as World War I got under way. The excavation in 1999 was thorough, but then the interest by the people of Mainz again petered out.
This time Marg is hoping for more support from the local community. The potential to put the theatre to use again is there, he says. “On the [annual] open day for historical monuments, thousands of people came to have a look.”