Carla Mooney - Stadiums and Coliseums

Stadiums and Coliseums

Carla Mooney

Thousands of fans crowd into an enormous stadium to watch a soccer match under the bright lights.

H ave you ever watched a live professional football game or rocked to your favorite band in concert? You probably watched these events in a stadium. A stadium is a structure where people watch sports competitions, music concerts, and other events. Participants play on a field or perform on a stage surrounded by .

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Another word for stadium is coliseum.

Think your school auditorium holds a lot of people? Stadiums are some of the biggest public structures in the world. Some stadiums have seats for more than 100,000 people. In fact, the largest stadium in the world is the Rungrado May Day Stadium in Pyongyang, North Korea. It seats 150,000 people!

Completed in 1989 and considered the largest stadium in the world, the Rungrado May Day Stadium in Pyongyang, North Korea, is used for a variety of events including soccer matches, sporting events, and festivals.

Most stadiums are built to host sporting events. In many places, professional sports teams partner with cities to build stadiums for baseball, football, and soccer teams. Colleges and universities build stadiums for their athletic teams. Governments also build stadiums for special events, such as the Olympic Games.

The city of London built the Olympic Stadium when it hosted the 2012 Summer Olympic Games. Beginning in 2016, the stadium will be used to host soccer matches, sporting events, and live music concerts.

Located in Arlington, Texas, AT&T Stadium is the home of the Dallas Cowboys, a National Football League team. Completed in 2009, it is considered the worlds largest domed structure.

Building these super structures takes a lot of time, effort, and money. Stadium designs range from simple to complex. Building a stadium takes several years and hundreds of workers. Around the world, stadiums are some of the most amazing engineering wonders.

A tunnel-like entrance built with stone leads to the track in an early Greek stadium.

M ore than 3,000 years ago, ancient Greeks built the first stadiums. The word stadium comes from the word stadion, an ancient Greek unit of length that equaled about 630 feet (192 meters).

The first stadiums had a simple, flat track in the arena. The track was made from hard-packed clay and shaped like a U. It had start and finish lines at the two ends.

A stone with separate entrances was built alongside the track. From the stands, judges and spectators could watch the athletes. Sometimes early stadiums were built near natural hills. Spectators could sit on the hill for a clear view of the races. Later, the Greeks added stone and marble seats to the stands. They also added steps and divisions to make it easier for spectators to enter and exit the seating area.

Spectators sat on hills and surrounding land to watch the races on the track in early Greek stadiums.

As sporting competitions became more popular, many Greek towns built stadiums. In the fourth century BCE, the Panathenaic Stadium was built in Athens, Greece. It was built in a small valley, between the two hills of Agra and Ardettos, over the Ilissos River. The stadium hosted athletic events for the Great Panathenaia, a celebration of the city of Athens. Every four years, these sporting games were held in honor of the Greek goddess Athena.