Cartagena: The Roman Theatre

Cartagena is a pleasant city that’s been around for over 2000 years, so there’s plenty of history and archaeology to see. This is the central square, with the elegant Town Hall on the left.

After a few hours on the main shopping street, we head for the Roman Theatre. The site was rediscovered in 1988 and slowly excavated, resulting in the current museum and theatre restoration. It’s an impressive size, the second largest in Spain, right in the city centre- so how do you manage to “lose” something that big for so many centuries?

It was a top theatre in its day with high grade workmanship, as shown by this headless statue. The folds in the marble look so realistic. 

A real oddity is the cathedral that was constructed on the top level of the theatre in the 13^th century. It was modified several times over the years but was destroyed by aerial bombing during the Spanish Civil War (1936 to 1939). The ruins are visible under the crane in the photo.

A closer look shows it to have been a splendid building; it’s still used as a venue during the annual Cartagena Music Festival. 

Roman theatres in general presented a range of plays, comedies and tragedies, as well as variety acts like juggling. Here there was also an orchestra area, so lots more possibilities although there was no specific information on actual performances; it’s all been lost in the mists of time.

The orchestra occupied the semi-circle in front of the stage and I’ve greyed out the blocks of flats in the background to make the outline of the theatre ruins clearer.

The museum, housed in a separate building, also summarised the history of Cartagena up to current times, with exhibits bearing descriptions in English and Spanish. All very interesting and well displayed.