How were the gladiator fights in Rome

The Ancient Rome It was a civilization with a great variety of traditions, many of which have been represented throughout history in popular culture, as movies or books. Possibly the most recognized tradition in Ancient Rome is that of gladiatorial fighting, a discipline that has always been surrounded by an air of grandeur and epic. Because of the importance of this tradition, today in this lesson from a PROFESSOR we are going to talk about how were the gladiator fights in Rome.

Gladiators were armed combatants whose function was entertain the public in Ancient Rome, facing other gladiators, animals or against condemned to death. Gladiators could be free men who had lost their rights as citizens, slaves, criminals, or prisoners of war.

Originally, gladiators were a funeral custom of the Etruscans, a town from which the Romans are descended. Gladiators, usually prisoners, fought each other while the corpse of the deceased burned on a funeral pyre. These battles during the Etruscan burials could be considered the first gladiatorial fights. Gladiator fights, like many other burial traditions of the Etruscans, became

Public shows, to entertain the Roman public and divert their attention from other matters.

Gladiator fighting ceased to be a funerary tradition during the Roman Republic. The Roman leaders created this tradition to be able to obtain the recognition and favor of the inhabitants, to have a greater chance of being elected in the Roman elections.

With the arrival of the Empire the gladiator fights they became great events, some of which were organized by the emperors themselves. Fighting was an important part of Roman society until the end of the Roman Empire.

In this other lesson we offer you a brief summary of the history of sports in Ancient Rome.

On the day of the fights, the gladiators went to the amphitheater where the show was carried out through the city. Once there the gladiators warmed up, fighting each other with wooden weapons or blunt weapons, as a kind of simulation of the combat that was to take place. The lanistas, the people who bought and sold gladiators, they chose the gladiators who were to compete in the show.

Battles lasted until one gladiator triumphed over the other. After this the gladiator asked the public if the defeated should die or not. Gladiators did not usually die, being saved on most occasions by the people, according to some studies most gladiator deaths were due to injuries suffered during the fight.

On the few occasions when gladiators were sentenced to death by the public, the winner stuck his gun to the heart of the adversary, to give a quick death to the loser. The gladiator sentenced to death offered no resistance, facing his death with dignity.

During the Low Empire, the ability to forgive or condemn to death was held only by the emperor, losing this right the public of the event. The emperor could also free the gladiator, giving him a blunt sword, as a symbol that he could leave the profession of gladiator.

Gladiators who died during the fighting were taken to the espoliario by the slaves who worked in the arenas. The slaves used a hook and took them out through the so-called Door of Death. The door led to the Spoliarium, a room where the corpses were deposited, and where their clothes and weapons were taken from them.

To continue with this lesson on what gladiator fights were like in Rome, we must talk about the different types of gladiators that existed. The fighters had different denominations, depending on their function and their type of weapons, some of the types are the following:

• Samnites: They took their name from the weapons of the Samnites, an Italic people. They carried a large shield, a helmet with a visor, a leg protection, an armband that covered the arm and shoulder, and a short sword. He was the first known type of gladiator.
• The murmillos: Armed with a gladius and protected with a rectangular shield. It is believed that their weapons came from the Gauls.
• Thracians: They were armed with a kind of curved sword and protected by a rectangular shield.
• Secutors: Their weapons were the same as those of the murmillos, except for their helmet, designed to avoid being caught by the reciarians' net.
• Reciaries: They faced the secutors. His characteristic weapons were a trident and a net. The gladiator caught the opponent with the net and then finished off him with the trident.