History of Gladiatorial Games Essay Example for Free

History of prizefighterial Games EssayHistory of prizefighterial games Origins Early literary sources seldom agree on the origins of prizefighters and the gladiator games.1 In the late 1st coulomb BC, Nicolaus of Damascus believed they were Etruscan.2 A generation later, Livy wrote that they were first held in 310 BC by the Campanians in celebration of their victory over the Samnites.3 Long after the games had ceased, the 7th century AD source Isidore of Seville derived Latin lanista (manager of gladiators) from the Etruscan word for executioner, and the title of Charon (an official who accompanied the dead from the Roman gladiatorial arena) from Charun, psychopomp of the Etruscan underworld. 4 Roman historians emphasised the gladiator games as a foreign import, most likely Etruscan. This preference informed most regulation histories of the Roman games in the early modern era.5Reappraisal of the evidence supports a Campanian origin, or at to the lowest degree a borrowing, fo r the games and gladiators.6 The earliest known Roman gladiator schools (ludi) were in Campania.7 Tomb frescoes from Paestum (4th century BC) show polar fighters, with helmets, spears and shields, in a propitiatory funeral blood-rite that anticipates early Roman gladiator games.8 Compared to these images, supporting evidence from Etruscan tomb-paintings is tentative and late. The Paestum frescoes may represent the continuation of a much older tradition, acquired or inherited from Greek colonists of the 8th century BC.9Livy dates the earliest Roman gladiator games to 264 BC, in the early stages of Romes First Punic War against Carthage. Decimus Iunius Brutus Scaeva had three gladiator pairs fight to the death in Romes cattle market Forum (Forum Boarium) to honor his dead father, Brutus Pera. This is described as a munus (plural munera), a commemorative duty owed the manes of a dead ancestor by his descendants.10 The gladiator eccentric used (according to a single, later source), w as Thracian.11 but the development of the munus and its gladiator types was most strongly influenced by Samniums support for Hannibal and subsequent punitive expeditions by Rome and her Campanian allies the earliest and most frequently mentioned type was the Samnite.12The war in Samnium, immediately afterwards, was attended with equal danger and an equally glorious conclusion. The enemy, besides their different warlike preparation, had made their battle-line to glitter with new and splendid arms. There were two corps the shields of the one were inlay with gold, of the other with silverThe Romans had already heard of these splendid accoutrements, but their generals had taught them that a soldier should be rough to touch on, not adorned with gold and silver but putting his trust in iron and in courageThe Dictator, as decreed by the senate, celebrated a triumph, in which by far the finest show was afforded by the captured armour. So the Romans made use of the splendid armour of their enemies to do honour to their gods while the Campanians, in number of their pride and in hatred of the Samnites, equipped after this fashion the gladiators who furnished them diversion at their feasts, and bestowed on them the name Samnites. (Livy 9.40)13Livys account skirts the funereal, sacrificial function of early Roman gladiator combats and underlines the later theatrical ethos of the gladiator show splendidly, exotically armed and armoured barbarians, treacherous and degenerate, are dominated by Roman iron and inherent courage.14 His plain Romans virtuously dedicate the magnificent spoils of war to the Gods. Their Campanian allies stage a dinner entertainment using gladiators who may not be Samnites, but play the Samnite role. Other groups and tribes would join the cast total as Roman territories expanded. Most gladiators were armed and armoured in the manner of the enemies of Rome.15 The munus became a morally interpretative form of historic enactment in which the only honourable option for the gladiator was to fight well, or else die well.