Tour Guide, Rome, Italy
| 2 mins read
Who were they? Where were they coming from? And where does their name come from? They were mainly slaves: in case the Romans resulted as winners, at the end of a battle, they would eventually enslave part of the defeated population, to use them as servants, as construction builders, and also as Gladiators.
Since the famous Ben Hur came out, and because of other more recent movies, we have got this idea that the Gladiators are being forced into death through matches only. Well, even if this might look compelling for a movie's plot, it is absolutely not true.
The reason why we can positively affirm the opposite, is because we know quite well how slaves became Gladiators. Taken away from their families, they are being trained to fight for months, and then provided with weapons and armours. Of course, during all this time, they are fed, given a place to sleep and taken good care of.
So the answer to the following question is pretty simple: who would want to invest so much time and money on someone? who would probably be killed on his first fight? Nobody! This is why, Gladiators were absolutely not forced to fight to death at every match, but just in some particular cases, for example if they were known criminals.
About their name, the most common types of gladiator (there are different types according to what weapons and armor they use) carry with them their gory sword, which in Latin is “ gladius ”. This is the reason why men carrying the gladius obviously became the gladiators! Not everything seen on the movies matches the truth! Actually, almost nothing.