Enter Piazza dell’Anfiteatro through one of its four passages and the surrounding houses close into an oval. That curve follows a Roman amphitheatre built outside Lucca’s ancient walls in the first or second century CE. The Roman structure lies about three metres below the present square, its shape carried into the city that grew above it.
After the amphitheatre fell into ruin, its stone became building material. Later houses reused the surviving structures, preserving the ellipse through centuries of change. Walk along Via dell’Anfiteatro outside the piazza as well as through the open space within: the two routes reveal how an ancient building became part of the street plan.
The public square took its present form from 1830, when architect Lorenzo Nottolini removed buildings from the centre and laid out the surrounding street. The intervention opened the oval while retaining the buildings around its rim. Roman remains survive below ground and within later construction; the four passages used today should not all be read as original Roman entrances.
The place rewards a slow circuit rather than a single photograph. Follow the curve, leave through another passage and reconnect with Lucca’s streets. Pair it with the Walls of Lucca to see another large historic structure absorbed into everyday public life, then use our Lucca guide to plan the rest of the city.
