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Updated: May 22, 2025
He hates gladiatorial shows; he despises even the tasteless pageantry of the Roman theatre; he heartily loves books; he is saving up all his earnings to buy a coveted library for his old age; he has a real enthusiasm for great writers; he breaks through national pride, and feels sincerely grateful to the Greeks as the authors; of civilization, rogues though he knew them to be in his time; he mourns, albeit with an apology, over the death of a slave; his slaves evidently are attached to him, and are faithful to him at the last; he writes to his favourite freedman with all the warmth of equal friendship.
Every one who took contracts for buildings bought architect-slaves; every one who undertook to provide spectacles or gladiatorial games on account of those giving them purchased or trained a company of slaves skilled in acting, or a band of serfs expert in the trade of fighting.
Bright-beady of eye, bony of cheek and jaw, scarred, toughened, broken and reknit, indestructible, grisly, gladiatorial as a hornet, he was a type neither new nor unfamiliar. Raidler was the product of a different soil. Six feet two in height, miles broad, and no deeper than a crystal brook, he represented the union of the West and South.
If the gladiatorial fight was a cruel sacrifice to the prevailing desire for great spectacles, dueling is a cruel sacrifice to existing prejudices a sacrifice, not of criminals, slaves and prisoners, but of the noble and the free. There are a great many traits in the character of the ancients which show that they were entirely free from these prejudices.
An intense stillness fell over the gathering such a hush as marked the circus arena in Rome when gladiatorial combatants came together in the death-struggle. As Annas, the All-Powerful head of God's elect priesthood, neared the end of the open path cut through the throng, the Galilean lifted his eyes from the surrounding scene and entered into some high place of communion.
Again the awful syllables were spoken, and the victim fell dead. "Two," counted the king. And so the deadly game went on, till about a hundred bodies were stretched in rows behind us. I have heard of the gladiatorial shows of the Cæsars, and of the Spanish bull-fights, but I take the liberty of doubting if either of them could be half so horrible as this Kukuana witch-hunt.
Slaves were such through political and social causes, and their masters were bidden to refrain from ill-using them, not only because of the cruelty of such conduct, but because of "the natural law common to all men," and because "he is of the same nature as thyself." Seneca denounced the gladiatorial shows as human butcheries.
It was commonly declared among expert swordsmen and connoisseurs of sword-play, as among recent spectators, when, talking over the features of an exhibition after it was over, that practically every thrust, lunge or stroke of either in these bouts would have killed or disabled any other adversary; certainly it appeared so to me every time I saw them fence and especially while watching their bouts after I returned from my year at Baiae, for after that I never missed a gladiatorial exhibition in the Colosseum.
It is the remark of Capitoline, that "gladiatoria spectacula omnifariam temperavit; temperavit etiam scenicas donationes;" he controlled in every possible way the gladiatorial spectacles; he controlled also the rates of allowance to the stage performers.
With an open mind I go, reeking naught of the pro's and con's of the subject of the debate. I go as to a gladiatorial show, eager to applaud any man who shall wield his sword brilliantly. If a 'stranger' indulge in applause, he is tapped on the shoulder by one of those courteous, magpie-like officials, and conducted beyond the precincts of the Palace of Westminster. I speak from hearsay.
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