We are talking of a time period where the writing materials where of two types, Parchment, which was just skins of animals someone did not make into leather, and papyrus, which was only available from Egypt, cheaper then Parchment but did not last in wet climates. Bark was also used for short messages. The records we do have are limited to what someone really wanted to preserve. Books were written, but then used by speakers to tell the stories to audiences. Books were also kept, but only if someone wanted to keep them for later use. Parchment can last for 1000 years, and often kept for centuries after they were written and released time after time to speakers who made a living reading these old books to the public.
My point is we do NOT have any day to day writing like we have today. Printing only occurred in the 1400s due to the introduction of Linen paper in the late 1300s into Europe and the mid east. Linen is cloth, much cheaper material then parchment and cheap enough to be used in books made in mass (thus printing press was invented to use the new linen paper into books).
Pulp paper was invented in 1801 and in wide spread use by the 1830s. Pulp paper actually permitted cheaper books and newspapers. In fact what we call Newspapers are an invention of the 1850s as pulp paper came into general use, prior to pulp papers, newspapers were intended to be kept for months so people could see the ads in the papers. The concept of papers to be printed one day and thrown away that day required pulp paper. You could not do that with linen paper.
In fact public education was only truly possible with pulp paper. Thus in the 1830s you started to see what we would call Public Schools coming into existence. Pulp papers had made books cheap enough for even the poor to buy thus School books could be purchased and used by the students. In the days of Linen paper, only people who could afford expensive books learned to read and write, basically because you could survive quite well without needing to know how to read and write for we are talking about people who barely could afford the clothes on their back, let along spending even more money for books.
Now, that I have gone through the history of the Technology of information up to about 1900 (Computers have made information even cheaper and easier to get today), let go back to the records of the Roman Empire.
In the days of Rome, Parchment was the writing material of choice. Many writers also kept papyrus around for letters not expected to be kept for years. Many people paid others to write letters for them and then send them to relatives and friends, who paid people to read those letters to them. Letters to most people were so rare you can make the argument the learning to read was NOT worth the cost of learning to read in that time period unless you were in the elites who need to exchange ideas and information.
Thus in the days of Rome, what survives tends to be books that later people though worth copying or fragments of other writing that some how survived the last 2000 years.
Now, the people of Rome preferred the Circus to the Coliseum for the races were NOT considered fixed. St Peter is traditionally considered to have been killed in the Circus (part of which the church of St Peter sits on) NOT the Coliseum. It is believed that is where St Paul died (The deaths of St Peter and St Paul is NOT in the bible, where they died and how is by oral tradition written a little bit later then the present gossips and Act of the Apostles).
A further factor was Nero blamed the Christians for the fire of Rome and persecuted them afterward, the Coliseum had NOT yet been built. Thus any executions would have been at the Circus Maximus OR elsewhere in Rome.
In 69 AD, in the year named "The Year of the Four Emperors" Nero was overthrown and killed by his slave, when Galba had marched his army from present day Serbia and Croatia to Rome to over throw Nero. In turn Galba was killed by the Praetorian Guards by Otho, who promised to pay the Praetorian Guards money they believed they had been promised when they help overthrow Nero. Otho in turn was defeated in battle and committed suicide and Vitelius took over as his Army Marched from Gaul.
The problem was the most powerful Roman Army of the Time Period was putting down the Jewish revolt, Vespasian was its commander, he had supported Galba, but had opposed both Otho and Vitelius. He was actually in Egypt taking control of Egypt (and thus the Grain Supply to Rome) when his supporters defeated Vitelius and declared Colosseum sole Emperor.
One of the first things Vespasian did was start building the Roman Colosseum. Unlike the Circus, which always was where any riots or other unrest in Rome started, we have no records of such unrest involving the Colosseum. Once you understand how it was organized you quickly see way. The Colosseum was NOT for the people of Rome, the People of Rome had the Circus, which was much larger, the Colosseum was for the bureaucrats of Rome. It was where they received their orders. The Gladiator fights were entertainment between messages from the Emperor, thus we have people reporting refusing to view the Gladiator fights for they hated them but going to the Colosseum every time it was open. Why? It was where you received your "Email" from the Boss. It was where you saw who was in favor of the Emperor and who was out of favor (by seeing who was sitting where). This was also true of the people around you, each seat was "Reserved" for a single person, and the better seats in your section went to the people who were in favor of your boss, the people in the worse seats were the people out of favor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vespasian
It should be noted, that when Constantine build Constantinople, he did several other changes. First he abolished the Praetorian Guards and replaced them with his scholae, a group of Cavalrymen assigned to protect the Emperor. This later came to be a term used to name the people in the retinue of the Emperor and later the pope and bishops. By the ninth Century it had become the modern word "Scholar" that is someone who studies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholae_Palatinae
The Second thing Constantine did was build a Circus, then a Church, then his Palace. The Church and Palace occupied the two highest points in Constantinople. Read elsewhere about the Red Palace and St Sophia. Notice Constantine did NOT build a Colosseum, he relied on the Church to get his messages to his bureaucrats for his Empire was NOT centralized in Rome, but more a modern Nation-State and thus he needed to keep in contact with people from everywhere in the Empire NOT just who controlled Rome.
That was NOT true of Vespasian. Rome was the single largest City in the World (And would remain so till somewhere between 450 and 525 AD, it is unclear when Constantinople past Rome in Population but as late as 405 Rome was still larger). Thus the control over Rome and its Bureaucrats was important to whoever ruled Rome in the First Century. During the Rule of Augustus Caesar (died 14 AD) the Plebeian council still meet.
Since about 287 BC the Plebeian Council had been the equal to the Senate and had the right to make laws independent of the Senate and to try cases. This was one of the powers both Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar wanted. By the time of the Sulla (c 80 BC) the Council had become a place where rich men who were not patricians controlled the law. The poor had lost power to the rich Plebeians. Thus the poor had no way to express their desire, thus full heartily had supported Marius and his reforms (Marius was the Uncle of Julius Caesar), later both Julius and Augustus Caesar. Under both Caesar the Council became a place for bureaucrat within the new Imperial Government meet and interacted and exchanged ideas and received their orders from the Emperor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Marius
The council kept meeting till the Rule of Tiberius when the last meeting of that council was held, confirming what the Plebeian Council had done under Augustus, giving the Emperor the right to do anything the Plebeian council would do.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plebeian_Council#After_27_BC
Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero all ruled without calling the Plebeian council into session. One of the reasons for the Year of Four Emperors was not only were the Army units NOT talking to each other, neither were the bureaucrats. Thus you had to many people NOT getting on message. This was the problem Vespasian wanted to solve with the Colosseum. It would like when he called his junior officers together to tell them what the plan of battle was to be, but in the case of the Colosseum it was NOT his junior Officers he wanted to tell in one time period, but all of the bureaucrats in Rome (including bureaucrats visiting from outside Rome).
That was the background for the Colosseum, it was built over the location of Nero's Place to show the people of Rome that Nero and the Julio-Claudian Dynasty was no more. T That the Colosseum was for bureaucrats can be see in the seating:
The first tier, called the Podium (meaning place of honor), was reserved for the most important Romans - the Emperor, the Vestal Virgins, the important priests and members of the Roman Government including the Roman Senators. The Podium was like a flat platform, or terrace, measuring 15ft wide
2nd Tier - Maenianum primum: This seating was reserved for the non-senatorial noble class called the Equites, or knights consisting of fourteen rows of stone or marble seats
3rd Tier was originally reserved for ordinary Roman citizens, the plebeians. Seating was then divided into two sections:
Maenianum secundum imum - the better, lower seats for the wealthy plebeians
Maenianum secundum summum - the upper seats for the poor plebeians
4th Tier - Maenianum summum in ligneis: Consisted of steep wooden seats which were set up in the gallery running around the very top wall of the amphitheatre which were added during the reign of Domitian
This would seat common women
Slaves were strictly forbidden from the Colosseum
Standing Room - there was standing room in the top tier and in the aisles
Some groups were banned from the Colosseum including actors, gravediggers and former gladiators
http://www.tribunesandtriumphs.org/colosseum/seating-at-the-colosseum.htmThus you had the Emperor and the Senators all around him
Then members of the Equestrian Order, the ordered favored by the early emperors for they tended to be more honest then the rich of the other two classes.
Then members of the 1% who where NOT Senators or Equestrians. More Bureaucrats of the time period.
The Next level was for "poor Plebeians" i,e, the Bureaucrats who actually did the work, the office help.
The top level were for women. The Article pointed out this was built by Domitian, who was the son of Vespasian. Vespasian barely lived long enough to complete the Colosseum and Domitian's older brother only ruled for two years, thus the Colosseum was still under construction when the woman's galley was added.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domitian
One last comment, woman were part of the Bureaucracy of the Roman Empire, so these seats, while on top, where for these Bureaucrats also to see what was the situation in Rome. Women had NOT been part of the Plebeian Council but had always been around when such council meetings took place. Thus by the time of Domitian it was clear they needed to know what was going on and receive what the Emperor wanted them to know.
Now, the message was not always verbal. Execution were done in the Colosseum, so the Bureaucrats would know who was executed and why (remember we are talking about a time period when Parchment was supreme, which given its price, the Colosseum was cheaper).
Thus could Christians have been executed in the Colosseum? The Answer is yes, but the great persecutions in Rome occurred under Nero, before the Colosseum was built and except for criminals the Emperor wanted the Bureaucrats to see (other Bureaucrats and politicians out of favor with the Emperor) the Circus was where executions took place, for there such executions helped to keep the masses in line.
Thus we may NOT have a record of a Christian being killed in the Colosseum for the Crime of being a Christian. Domitian was succeed by Nerva, who founded the Nerva–Antonine Dynasty which was a series of Adopted Emperors till the Sixth Emperor of that Dynasty, Marcus Aurelius left his son become his heir in 180 AD.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Aurelius
Nerva was succeed by Trajan, who proceeded to expand the Empire to its limit but also is known to tell one of his lieutenants that while the law forbade Christianity, do not look for them and if they come before you and say they are no longer a Christian accept that. I.e. Rome under both the Flavian Dynasty and the Nerva–Antonine were very tolerate as to Christians and unless they had other good reasons to execute a Christian it was NOT done. You had local persecutions but nothing widespread till Diocletian's rule in the late 200s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trajan
By the time of Diocletian's rule, the Emperors rarely went to Rome preferring to stay with the Army. Even the extend of Diocletian's persecution is suspect (His wife and daughter both ended up being executed for being "Christians" by Licinius after the death of Diocletian):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Licinius
Those deaths were before Constantine the Great defeated Lincinius and became sole Emperor and installing the Neo-Flavian Dynasty (yes same family as Vespasian but by 312 Christian).
Thus it is possible no Christians were executed in the Colosseum, except for some other reason (i.e. the Emperor wanted them dead and the fact they were Christian was a perfect excuse). Most Christians, when they would be executed, would be executed at the Circus (or elsewhere) for it was unimportant to the Emperor who saw them die.
On the other hand, the Rich Roman Elite, no matter the class or sex, and the Bureaucrats (no Matter class or sex) would be executed in the Colosseum so their fellow one percenters could see the execution and know WHY they were executed (and it was rarely due to the fact they were Christians, that would be just a convenient excuse).
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