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I'm having trouble understanding the social status of gladiators. One one hand we have Spartacus who led a revolt. Did the Romans look at him as a lowly slave and then after the revolt, looked at him with respect? On the other hand we see victorious gladiators as noble heroes respected by the crowds and in some cases even emulated. It seems that although gladiators were respected by the general society there was still a type of negative stigma attached to them. Why? If what I'm reading is correct in saying that 50% of gladiators were slaves and the rest volunteers, then one can't really say the negative stigma was because they were slaves.Did Augustus change or help change the status of gladiators by looking at them less as performers and more as honorable warriors or maybe even national icons? Is this whole negative stigma thing because the Romans had a generally negative attitude towards performers (actors, etc)?
I think that initially, gladiators were slaves; this was likely due to the fact that they fought (to death?) to spill blood on the earth, which had a religious connotation (such fights were originally funerary games). Over time the nature of these fights changed so that they became a general form of entertainment. Gladiators became similar to our modern-day athletes, got paid higher, and they didn't normally fight to the death. I'm not sure about the individual case of Spartacus, and so I don't know what ticked him off. But I really don't think there was a "negative stigma" attached to gladiators (or performers) in Rome. Even Nero performed in the theater at one point, and one of the emperors (maybe Nero as well) did a chariot race in the Circus Maximus, which was a huge no-no simply because the emperor was not supposed to go into the arena area due to strict social roles. But gladiators and performers would have enjoyed much higher status than the common Roman citizen.
Here's (paraphrasing) what my textbook says. The chariot racers were esteemed because they mainly came from an aristocratic background, but the gladiators weren't because they were lower class. It does seem eventually the gladiators were respected and held in high regard, but it took a while, and I'm just confused at what point did this happen and why.
Don't ya hate when you are excited to think you've found a good, quality video when right at the start they say crap? Granted I didn't get much further than 5 minutes into this video (it's an hour long). Maybe I'll watch it later.Listen to what the lady in the red sweater says about a minute in. She is WRONG!! They did not fight to the death. Nearly all of the sources I've researched disagree with her.(so can you guess what I'm doing my paper on?)
Well I think she may be right depending on what time period she's talking about. If her area of specialty is earlier Roman history, then she may be correctly referring to that. BTW, the guy with the British accent who talks just before her - I think that is Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, an expert in Pompeii and Roman houses. He's pretty authoritative in his field.
Weren't the Gladiators slaves and prisoners at first, but later freedmen? Some of whom achieved the same level of fame and glory as modern athletes.
On second thought, perhaps that lady is correct. I think only a minority were spared
Weren't the Gladiators slaves and prisoners at first, but later freedmen?
Not sure if they were freed. I know at some point they were able to be freemen after being a gladiator for 5 years. Many stayed on as gladiators because of the fame and cash. Chicks flocked to them!!
Yes, it's my understanding that the early gladiatorial games were performed to the death or serious bodily harm, but later on when the games became much more popular during the Imperial period they didn't fight to the death. Let's face it – you don't really impose salary caps or have people becoming too famous for too long when they're fighting to the death.
Did the Romans see themselves as more advanced than other civilizations? In fact they saw themselves as the epitomy and height of achievement. It is my understanding that gladiators faced death as a metaphorical triumph, the way Rome conquered all people they encountered. If you promoted the greater glory of Rome, you would be embraced. Hadrian would build and rebuild the wall in Britain thinking there must be a way to tame these people, and with all the documentation of Roman occupied Britain, we never know if the wall was effective. I don't think it was, so noone wrote about it.
Did the Romans see themselves as more advanced than other civilizations?
I would say absolutely yes.
It is my understanding that gladiators faced death as a metaphorical triumph, the way Rome conquered all people they encountered.
At the height of the Empire there were different types of shows. Metaphorical deaths usually involved solely the slave or criminal gladiators where they would act out a mythological event and death almost always occurred. The actual gladiatorial combats between professional gladiators only had about a 1:10 death ratio because the spectacles became more secular in nature. Good gladiators became more costly, even when they lost as long as they fought valliantly and the combat was good entertainment, their life was usually spared.
Metaphorical deaths usually involved solely the slave or criminal gladiators where they would act out a mythological event and death almost always occurred. The actual gladiatorial combats between professional gladiators only had about a 1:10 death ratio because the spectacles became more secular in nature
That makes good sense, you do not allow your best fighters to just die, they have been trained and investment poured into them. It would be reasonable to do away with criminals and unwanted slaves.
