Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Orchestra

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rich, Anthony (1849). The illustrated companion to the Latin dictionary, and Greek lexicon. p. vi. OCLC 894670115. https://archive.org/details/illustratedcompa00rich. 

ORCHES'TRA (ὀρχήστρα). The orchestra of a Greek and Roman theatre; which occupied a corresponding position, as regards the rest of the edifice, with the pit of our theatres, and consisted of a flat open space in the centre of the building at the bottom, circumscribed by the lowest row of seats for the spectators, and the boundary wall of the stage in front, as shown by the annexed wood-cut (Orchestra/1.1), representing a view in the smaller theatre at Pompeii, in which the low wall on the left forms the boundary to the stage, and the flat semicircular recess on the right the orchestra.

2. In the Greek theatres, the orchestra was the spot where the Chorus stood and performed its evolutions, for which a considerable space was required; consequently, it was deeply recessed, and consisted of more than a semicircle, as shown by the plan of the Greek theatre s. THEATRUM, on which it is marked B. Plans of ten different theatres discovered in Lycia are engraved by Spratt and Forbes (Travels in Lycia, vol. ii. pl. 2.), all of which possess the same constructive form. In the centre of the orchestra was the thymele, or altar of Bacchus.

3. In the Roman theatres, the orchestra has a close affinity with our pit; for as the Romans had no chorus to their dramatic representations, it was occupied by spectators, being appropriated for the accommodation of the senators and persons of distinction (Suet. Aug. 35. Nero, 12. Jul. 39.); whence the word is used to designate the upper classes as opposed to the populace. (Juv. iii. 178.) It was likewise much smaller than the Greek orchestra, for the reason already given, and consisted of an exact semicircle, as shown by the plan of the theatre at Herculaneum s. THEATRUM, on which it is marked C.

• 
  Orchestra/1.1