Gladiators
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instead. This was a particular novelty for the Romans who were
used to all swordsmen fighting with both a blade and a shield.
According to Artemidorus, a man who dreamed of fighting as
a dimachaerus would marry a wife who was a poisoner, ugly, or
malicious.
Eques
The eques (cavalryman) was a gladiator who generally fought on
horseback, but could dismount if needed. A mosaic in Madrid
shows two equites fighting dismounted. They were armed
with a spear, carried a round shield in their left hand and had
a full-face visored helmet with a brim with a pair of plumes,
one on either side of the helmet bowl. Unusually, they wore a
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tunic and not just the subligaculum. Equites were often used to open the gladiatorial part of a munus, once the prolusio was over.
According to Artemidorus, any man who dreamed of competing
as an eques would end up with a wife who was both noble and
rich, but not very intelligent.
Essedarius
Essedarii were charioteers, supposedly based on the British
chariots Julius Caesar encountered in 55 and 54 BC and which
Julius Agricola found again during his campaigns in Scotland
under Domitian. Such chariots were extremely light vehicles,
designed for speed and manoeuvrability. Artemidorus believed
that a man who dreamed of fighting as an essedarius would
marry a woman who was lazy and stupid (presumably because
the charioteer did not bother to dismount in the arena and they
had the reputation for being rather dim).
Female gladiator
The word gladiatrix is a modern invention and was unknown to
the Romans. Female gladiators were known but fought in one
of the known armaturae, rather than being a specific type in its
own right.
Gaul
The Gallus (normally translated as ‘Gaul’, but it also means
‘cockerel’, ‘priest of Attis’ and ‘reaping machine’ – there was
potential for humour if nothing else) was another type of
gladiator derived from a particular nationality. Gauls had a
particular significance for the Romans, partly because they had
attacked Rome in 390 BC, according to tradition (there are
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complicated reasons for disputing the date). Little is known
about the equipment of the Gallus – they may have been
equipped like Gallic nobility and worn helmets and mail shirts,
carried a large shield, and wielded a long sword, but it is also
possible that they fought like ordinary warriors, naked but for
the shield and sword. The type had largely disappeared by the
Augustan period.
Hoplomachus
The hoplomachus was effectively a Roman gladiatorial tribute to
the hoplite of classical Greece. Equipped with a small circular
shield, a spear and probably at least some body armour, they
were similar to Samnites. They would have been slow and
cumbersome, but well-protected and, importantly, with a greater
reach than a sword-armed opponent.
Laquearius
The laquearius is thought by some to have been a variant of the
retiarius, perhaps even a novelty act. Instead of a net, they were
equipped with a lasso.
Murmillo
The murmillo (or myrmillo) was originally the chief opponent
for the retiarius. but could also be found fighting the thraex. The
name, which comes from a small, salt-water fish, played upon
the appearance of retiarius as a kind of fisherman. They were
equipped with a helmet, armguard, rectangular shield and a
greave. They were found from the 1st to the 3rd centuries AD.
Festus recorded a taunt supposedly levelled at a murmillo by a
retiarius:
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Equites fighting on foot (photo by Carole Raddato)
A retiarius fi ghting against a murmillo chanted ‘Why do you fl ee,
Gaul? I’m after the fi sh, not you!’, because the murmillo fought
with Gallic weaponry and because murmillones used to be Gauls,
with a depiction of a fi sh on the helmet. (Festus 358 L)
Paegnarius
Th e paegnarius was to some extent an entertainment act, rather
than a ‘serious’ gladiator. Lacking armour, they were protected
with just padding on the left arms and equipped with whips or
canes. Th ey seem to have been more akin to slapstick comedy
than combat to the death.
Pontarius
Th e pontarius (‘bridge man’) was a variant of the retiarius . A
rectangular wooden platform with ramps at either end was
provided for the retiarius , together with a supply of rocks instead
of a net. His opponent, a murmillo or secutor , then tried to
assault the ramp under a hail of stone. Such a scene is depicted
on a relief from Kos in Greece showing the retiarius Kritos and
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his assailant Mariskos. The relief is damaged on one side so it is
possible there was a second attacker on the other ramp. This is
suggested by a barbotine-decorated pot from Lyon showing a
trident-armed pontarius called Scorpus fending off two attackers
(Flamma and Februarius) with rocks.
Provocator
The provocator (‘challenger’) was equipped in much the same way
as the murmillo, with a helmet, rectangular shield, armguard and
greave. Inscriptions mentioning provocatores are known from
Rome (Anicetus and Pardus), Pergamum (Nympheros) and
Pompeii (Mansuetus). The type was known in the 1st century
BC, as is clear from a passage from Cicero:
... as the fact is that this band did not consist of men picked out
of those who were for sale, but of men bought out of jails, and
adorned with gladiatorial names, while he drew lots to see whom
he would call Samnites, and whom provocatores, who could avoid
having fears as to what might be the end of such licentiousness
and such undisguised contempt for the laws? (Cicero, For Sestius
64.134)
Some provocatores seem to have worn a small breastplate
( cardiophylax) protecting the upper chest at the front and held in
place by straps, visible on the back. It is generally held that they
only ever fought other provocatores but this assertion is difficult
to prove.
Retiarius
The retiarius (‘net man’) first appears under the Empire. Armed
only with a trident, a net and a knife, he was lightly armoured,
wearing only a shoulderguard and armguard most of the time.
His only clothing was the loin cloth and ankle bindings. Using
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Paegnarii (photo by Carole Raddato)
speed to both evade and tire his opponent, he would cast his
net in an attempt to snare or trip up the more heavily armoured
gladiator lumbering after him.
Occasionally, a retiarius would fi ght in a tunic, in which case
he was known (unsurprisingly) as a retiarius tunicatus !
A Gracchus fi ghting, not indeed as a murmillo , nor with the
round shield and scimitar: such accoutrements he rejects,
indeed rejects and detests;
nor does a helmet shroud his face.
See how he wields his trident! And when with poised right hand
he has cast the trailing net in vain, he lifts up his bare face to the
benches and fl ies, for all to recognise, from one end of the arena
to the other. We cannot mistake the golden tunic that fl utters
from his throat, and the twisted cord that dangles from the
high-crowned cap; and so the pursuer who was pitted against
Gracchus endured a shame more grievous than any wound.
(Juvenal, Satires 8.199–210)
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Secutor (‘pursuer’)
• Armour: helmet, greave, armguard, curved
rectangular shield
• Special feature: short sword
• Period: Imperial
• Common opponent: retiarius
Th ere is some suggestion (largely innuendo in Juvenal’s Satires )
that such retiarii were viewed as eff eminate.
Although the origins of the retiarius are often assumed to
have been in fi shing (despite the fact that fi shermen would
tend to use a net or a spear, but seldom both), it has been
pointed out that they may have had a more martial origin. In
332 BC, the inhabitants of the island city of Tyre used tridents
and nets to defend themselves against the siege mounted by
Alexander the Great.
A skull from the gladiator cemetery at Ephesus shows
the result of a fatal blow from a trident. Th e spacing of the
horrendous wounds exactly matches that of the tines of
surviving tridents.
Th e earliest depictions of a retiarius – on glass vessels from
Lyon dating to the late 1st century BC – shows a man with a
net and trident not only wearing greaves but also, apparently,
body armour. A marvellous 2nd century AD pot from a grave
in Colchester depicts a retiarius called Valentinus appealing
for clemency, having been defeated by the secutor Memnon. A
3rd-century AD mosaic from Spain shows events from a fi ght
between a secutor Astyanax and the retiarius Kalendio, who is
marked with a Θ (theta) to show that he lost and was killed.
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Gladiators on pottery from Colchester (photo by Carole Raddato)
Th e classic opponents for the retiarius (or contraretiarii , as
they were known) were the murmillo and, later, the secutor ,
both of whom appear to have specialised in fi ghting the net
man. Retiarii were the principal gladiator type to fi ght from a
makeshift platform known as a ‘bridge’ ( pons ), in which case
they might be described as a pontarius . Here they substituted
their speed (and their net) for a height advantage and, by way
of compensation, it seems, a pile of rocks for throwing at their
would-be assailants!
Artemidorus was of the opinion that dreaming of being a
retiarius meant a man’s wife would be both poor and apt to
wander (because the retiarius depended on moving around a lot
and was of comparatively low status even amongst gladiators).
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Pontarius in action (drawing by M. C. Bishop)
Sagittarius
The sagittarius was an archer, equipped with the recurved composite
bow. To achieve maximum efficiency with this weapon (both in
terms of rate of shooting and accuracy), an archer needed to practise
all their lives, so a gladiator who adopted this armatura could never
be as proficient with the composite bow as a native from a region
where it was used who had grown up with the weapon.
Samnite
The Samnite ( samnis) was one of the earliest types of gladiator.
They owe their origins to the Samnite Wars which Rome fought
against the inhabitants of Samnium during the second half of the
4th century BC. Samnites fought with the gladius and carried the
curved, rectangular body shield. They normally wore a greave on
the left shin and had some form of protection on the sword arm,
either padding or a metallic armguard. On their head they wore
a broad-brimmed helmet with a visor that completely covered
the face. There is a record of an early Samnite in the 2nd-century
BC writer Lucilius:
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In the public show given by the Flacci was a certain Aeserninus,
a Samnite, a nasty fellow, worthy of that life and station. He was
matched with Pacideianus, who was by far the best of all the
gladiators since the creation of man. (Lucilius, Satires 2.172–5)
Scaeva
The left-handed gladiator ( scaeva) was a novelty act that flew in
the face of the normal style of hand-to-hand combat. Romans
(and, indeed, nearly every body else in the ancient world) fought
with a sidearm (some form of sword or spear) in their right hand
and a shield in their left. When joining the army, for instance,
those who were naturally left-handed had to retrain to be right-
handed. The whole point of left- versus right-handed combat
was that it challenged both fighters to think laterally if they
hoped to win.
It is clear that a scaeva was not really a specific armatura in its
own right, but rather a subdivision of the standard armaturae.
Hence Commodus boasted on an inscription of being a secutor
of the primus palus who also fought left-handed, whilst a funerary
inscription from Sorrento describes a ‘ mirmillo’(!) as a scaeva and
a graffito from Pompeii depicts a man called Albanus fighting
with his shield in his right hand and sword in his left with the
abbreviation SC (for scaeva).
Scissor
The scissor seems to have been another name for the arbelas.
Secutor
The secutor (‘pursuer’ or ‘follower’, pl. secutores) was the standard
opponent for the retiarius, chasing him relentlessly around
the arena. The name was a joke on the personal assistants of
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Roman officials who followed them around closely. The secutor
was generally depicted armed with the classic short sword and
protected by a helmet, a curved rectangular shield, an armguard
on the sword arm and a greave on the shield leg. The helmet had
two simple eye holes, a small neck guard and a curving front-
to-back crest. Its smooth shape made it hard for the trident to
gain purchase and left little upon which the net could snag. It
was the Emperor Commodus’ favourite armatura and he was
allegedly named primus palus of the secutores 620 times. A
mosaic from Rome (now in the Museo Arqueológico Nacional
in Madrid) shows the secutor Astyanax triumphing against the
retiarius Kalendio, despite being covered by his opponent’s net.
Artemidorus wrote that any man who dreamed of fighting as
a secutor would marry a woman who (on the plus side) was
both attractive and rich, but (at the other extreme) proud and
disdaining her spouse (indicating that secutores had high status
amongst gladiators, but were a bit too vain).
Thracian
The Thracian ( thrax or thraex) was another of the earliest types
of gladiator, originating with captives from Rome’s wars at the
&nbs
p; beginning of the 1st century BC. The type was said to have
been introduced to the arena by Sulla. Equipped with a small
circular or square shield, their principal weapon was a sword
with a curve or angle in it ( sica). They wore a broad-brimmed
helmet with a protective visor and limb protection, usually a
greave on the left shin and an armguard or padding on their
sword arm. Those who fought as a Thracian did not necessarily
need to come from Thrace itself – Exochus (see above, p.53)
was from Alexandria in Egypt. According to Artemidorus, a
man who dreamed of fighting as a thraex would marry a wife
who was rich (because of all that armour), crafty (the angled
blade) and fond of being first (due to the Thracian method of
advancing).
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Secutor versus retiarius (photo by Carole Raddato)
Veles
The veles is assumed to have been a light-armed gladiator,
although no details about this armatura survive. Velites were the
light skirmishers of the early Republican legion and, as such,
missile-armed troops with little in the way of armour. The
gladiatorial veles was apparently similar and they fought each
other with spears.
Venator
Hunting was very popular in Roman society and was a regular
way of supplementing the normal diet with slightly exotic game.
It seems to have been one of the chief pastimes of bored soldiers
on Hadrian’s Wall, dedicating altars to hunting deities. It is no
surprise, then, that this was carried over into the arena with staged
wild beast hunts performed by huntsmen ( venatores). It might
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Astyanax defeats Kalendio
not seem like much of a spectator sport to us, but observing
the finer points of how a hunt was managed may have engaged
a crowd almost as much as watching duelling gladiators. There
was also the chance of an unexpected yet gory end for either the
animals, the hunter, or possibly even both.
On the same piece of pottery that depicts a pontarius,
there is a fragmentary hunting frieze with hares and boar
in the lower register. Elsewhere, scenes with hounds are
shown, suggesting that a different set of skills were being
demonstrated by venatores than those of the bestiarii fighting
against exotic big game.