Roman Gladiator Research Paper

582 Words3 Pages
The Role of Gladiators in Ancient Rome The strong and valiant gladiators of Rome will always be remembered as they were: Fearless, heroic and from time to time rebellious. They did not seem to fear death. At least, most of them. Either way that was their strength and allure. Gladiators were before anything else athletes. They fought to please the crowd. The famous phrase “Ave Imperator, morituri te salutant” may have melted and inspired many hearts. And fearless of death was what they had to be, there were many gladiator fights throughout the year. Many gladiators died, and not many lived. Some gladiators were able to survive. They were awarded the rudis, a wooden sword that granted those who earned it to be freed. Most gladiators who earned a rudis hadn’t won all of their fights. If a gladiator fought courageously, they weren’t punished for losing. That would displease the crowd and they were also useful instruments to entertain the people. It would make no sense to execute them instantly. Most gladiator…show more content…
They were used for entertainment. Most celebrations included gladiators and they were a relatively simple way of pleasing the populace. Most Romans loved the fights and blood. They often also adored the gladiators themselves. Many gladiators had acquired a group of fans. This is proven by graffiti found from ancient times. One example is Marcus Attilius. He was a man who voluntarily became a gladiator, presumably because he was in great debt. He gave up all of his honour and rights. Then, he defeated two successful fighters in the arena, one after the other, which was the reason someone decided to immortalise him through graffiti.23) In Rome, there was the possibility to support a certain faction. A faction consisted of fighters who all used similar outfits. An example of those is the parmularii, as referred to in Martial’s epigrams.24) The parmularii were a group of fighters who were heavily armed but used small shields, called the

More about Roman Gladiator Research Paper

Open Document