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The silver ribbon of road runs
through row upon row of gnarled olive trees, broken here
and there by areas of windswept naked steppe. Suddenly
you blink : at the end of the unbending road there is
an enormous and quite unexpected barrier standing out
against the horizon, dark ochre against the light. It
is the Colosseum of El Jem, the ancient city of Thysdrus,
one of the richest settlements in Roman Ifriqiya when
the Empire was at its apogee. |
| In Caesar's day it had been
little more than a small market town, but within two centuries
Thysdrus became one of the richest settlements in the
Province, challenging Hadrmumete [Sousse] for the status
of second city after Carthage. To what, then, did the
town the surrounding countryside : the olive tree and
the commercialization of olive oil. |
Situated some forty kilometers from the coast,
Thysdrus was the hub of a star shaped network of roads through
which the wealth of Central Tunisia was drawn off towards
the Roman ports on the coast and imported goods were funneled
towards the interior. This privileged location gave the town
considerable status as a market center for agricultural products.
It became, too, a place where traders and merchants gathered
to bargain and haggle. Did too much wealth attract the jealousy
of the Gods ?
Or was it man's own jealousy which brought about the downfall
of Thysdrus. In 238 A.D.the Emperor Maximus of Thrace brought
pressure to beau on the Province to fill his empty coffers
during a time of crisis.
In the subsequent revolt, which was lead from Thysdrus, the
Emperor sent in his troops, who crushed the local militia
and exacted heavy penalties on the town.
| This disastrous
defeat was followed by a slow but irrevocable decline.
However, the name of El Jem became a legend when the Berber
heroine "La Kahena" fought the newly arrived
Mohammedans, taking refugein the Roman amphitheatre which
was transformed into a fortress. At subsequent periods
in history the massive structure served as a refuge for
those who challenged the existing established authority.
To crush the |
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rebellion and bring the insurgents
to heel there was only one solution : partially dismantle
the building with concentrated cannon fire in 1850.
Much weakened, El Jem became little
more than a humble village built around the proud ruins
of the amphitheatre. It was not until more recent years,
when demographic forces and changes in Tunisian society
gave a certain impulse to urban development, that El Jem
was given a new lease of life.
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