The Stadio dei Marmi ("Stadium of the Marbles") is one of four stadiums in the colossal sports complex the Foro Italico, initially named Foro Mussolini. The other stadiums are the Stadio Olimpico, the Stadio del tennis Romano, and the Stadio Olimpico del Nuoto. It was designed in the 1920s as a complement to the annexed Fascist Academy of Physical Education (now the seat of CONI, Italian Olympic Committee), to be used by its students for training. The Stadio dei Marmi first opened in 1932, on the 10th anniversary of the March on Rome, near the Roman neighborhood Monte Mario, by the architect Enrico Del Debbio under the Fascist ruler Benito Mussolini. The Stadio dei Marmi is encircled by sixty, 4-meter tall classical statues of athletes made from Carrara marble. The stadium was built to celebrate Fascist accomplishments and the Gioventú del Littorio, the youth movement of the National Fascist Party of Italy. In its twenty-year reign, the Fascist regime used sports to introduce and instill new fascist traditions, ideals, customs, and values, with the goal of forming citizen warriors. The Stadio dei Marmi was used to host some of the field hockey preliminaries for the 1960 Summer Olympics and also hosted the opening ceremony for the 2009 World Aquatics Championships. History Early on, the Fascist movement saw the potential of using sports to promote its political and economic ideologies. Immediately after the March on Rome, the Fascist regime invested in large-scale sports arenas, buildings, and institutions, such as the Stadio dei Marmi, which made sports accessible to all classes of society. Through sports, Fascist institutions emphasized and promoted Fascist values, which developed a national identity. The most prevalent and valued sports included combat sports such as boxing, Greco-Roman wrestling, and javelin, hammer, or stone throwing. Through physical education and sports, the Fascist government aimed to create professional militia and warriors, who would readily enter war. Mussolini began the construction of the Foro Italico in 1928 as the central sports city and, in 1932, he opened the Instituto Superiore Fascista di Educazione (Fascist Institute for Physical Education) as the first male athletic institution. The importance that the Fascist regime placed on male physical education highlighted the characteristics of the ideal Fascist citizen, as well as the rigid gender binaries it instilled within Italian culture. After its unveiling, the Stadio dei Marmi became the leading physical education training center for the Gioventù