Italy to reconstruct Colosseum arena where sword-wielding gladiators once did battle

For visitors to Rome, it will be a chance to see the Colosseum as the gladiators once did as they gazed up in bowel-clenching anticipation before engaging in blood-spattered combat in front of the emperor.

Rome is to reconstruct the arena of the Colosseum, the vast oval-shaped space where gladiators armed with swords, tridents and nets did battle with each other and wild animals imported from all over the Roman Empire.

Tourists will be able to stroll out onto the rebuilt arena and look up at the vast stone tiers of seating that enclose the amphitheatre. The arena could also become a venue for concerts and other events.

Currently, there is just a tiny section of stage, and the rest of the arena is uncovered, so that visitors look down on a network of tunnels where wild animals were kept.

From there they were winched up in wooden cages, emerging from trap doors onto the sand-covered arena to the consternation of their human adversaries, as memorably portrayed in the Ridley Scott film Gladiator.

Italy’s culture minister has launched an international tender, inviting companies to put together a plan for reconstructing the arena.

Bids must be submitted by February 1, with the project expected to cost €18.5 million. Work is scheduled to get underway next year.

The stage will need to have retractable segments so that tourists can still view the tunnels where terrified beasts – from lions and leopards to ostriches and bulls - and nervous gladiators awaited their turn to fight.

“We want to put back the arena employing the same principles with which it was first built in ancient times,” said Alfonsina Russo, the Colosseum’s director.

“The reconstruction of the Colosseum’s arena is a great idea that will capture the world’s imagination,” said Dario Franceschini, the culture minister.

“It will offer visitors the chance to see not only the subterranean area, as they can today, but to contemplate the beauty of the Colosseum from its very heart.”

The idea of rebuilding the arena was first mooted years ago but has been delayed by bureaucracy and multiple changes of government.

It was the second major cultural heritage announcement in Rome in a few days.

On Friday, the city’s mayor announced that the vast Mausoleum of Augustus, where Augustus and other emperors were interred, will reopen to the public in March after a long restoration.

The mausoleum, which has been in a state of abandonment for decades, is the largest circular tomb in the world.

It was constructed in 28 BC near the banks of the Tiber to house the remains of Augustus and his heirs, including Tiberius, Caligula and Claudius.

Virginia Raggi said that after it opens to the public on March 1, entrance will be free until April 21, the day that Rome commemorates its founding in 753 BC.

The mausoleum has been restored thanks to a €10 million project which was partly financed by an Italian telecommunications company.