Despite of the common belief, the circus, in the shape and form that we are familiar of it today, doesn’t have its origins in the ancient Rome and the arena’s spectacles and performances, although many of its shows components derive from more than 2000 years ago. Nevertheless, man’s will to dominate over nature and animals was obvious in the roman arenas as much as in the circus ring. Besides, it does not seem incidental that the circus invention at the end of the 17th century coincides with the industrial revolution, a period of time in which, more than in any other, man feels, subconsciously at least, that his “savage” nature and many of his primitive instincts are fading while the satisfaction of his survival needs is now being transferred from himself to machines and artificial means. By the wild animals ostentatious submission to man’s will, the demonstration of the human body’s ability to survive and reach new heights of ascendancy over nature, as well as the reconciliation with the “suppressed” and the different, it seems that this loss is substituted up to a point and some new givens of the collective imaginary are being satisfied. This imaginary function of the circus shows its special social and anthropological character, establishing it as an object of research. Nevertheless, equally important appears to be the transient and ephemeral character of its structures , its metropolitan communicative use, as well as the nomadic way of life of its members.
 Τhrough this prism the circus can be seen as a closed structure, real as much as transient, that reflects structures and behaviors that are restless and exist in the social organizing of the world outside of it. Based on the above is the essay’s attempt to describe, observe and analyze matters of the architecture, the movement, the way of life, the myth and the various representations of the circus.