THE PUBLIC GAMES: THE THEATER, THE CIRCUS, AND THE AMPHITHEATER
=317. Roman Festivals: Their Great Number.=--One thing only, besides a
long session of the Senate, ordinarily will keep men of the class of
Publius Calvus away from the great thermæ--the celebration of one of
the greater Public Games.
The _Ludi Publici_, around which so large a part of Roman life
revolves, like the Pan-Hellenic games and similar Greek festivals,
always have religious origin; they are in honor of some god or group of
deities. But the secular has long intruded into their routine. Nobody
worries greatly about the fact that the _Ludi Apollinares_ are for the
glory of Apollo, save perhaps as one adds an extra fervent invocation
of the Delphian god during the placing of wagers. The time consumed by
the Public Games represents a period of recreation and festival, which
other ages will find in Sundays and Saints’ Days.
Altogether there are some 76 days per year normally set aside for these
great _Ludi Sollemnes_, including such prolonged periods as those of
the _Ludi Romani_ or _Magni_ which extend from September 4th to 18th,
on a stretch, with several others for six days and more. When to these
periods are added various extra or very special holidays, during which
the ordinary life of the city is broken up, the courts are closed, and
only the most necessary labors of commerce and industry are conducted,
it is plain that the plebeians and even the slaves get pretty ample
respite in their year of toil. Without attempting a close study of the
official lists of holidays it is safe to say that the average Roman
gains many more periods of lawful vacation than the laboring classes
can enjoy in other ages,--another factor which tends to make the
metropolis abound with idlers and parasites.
=318. Passion for Public Spectacles: Mania for Gambling.=--Besides
the great public theaters, amphitheaters, and race courses (circuses)
there are many smaller private establishments. Good money can be made
from gladiator fights and chariot races, and they are often given by
speculators, although more frequently in a provincial town than in Rome.
The passion for such spectacles and contests is incredible;--no
“baseball” or “football” of another era can so monopolize the popular
mind. The wagering on all kinds of contests is incessant in every
insula, shop, or mansion, and, of course, ordinarily it is entirely
lawful. Only the few select spirits cry out vainly against the passion,
although Juvenal’s famous protest will echo across the centuries, “The
Roman people who once gave commands, consulships, legions, and all
else now yearn simply for two things--_free bread and the Public
Games_!”
The government doubtless encourages this tendency. If the multitude
is engrossed with the merits of two charioteers, so much less is the
scrutiny upon strange doings at the Palatine; yet even excellent
emperors give very elaborate spectacles as a kind of lawful tribute
to the multitudes of that city which affords them their right to the
purple. After the conquest of Dacia, Trajan celebrated his victory by
giving contests which lasted 123 days, during which 10,000 wild and
domestic animals were said to have been killed and 10,000 gladiators
fought, although probably most of the latter were allowed to survive.
So incessant in fact are the contests of some variety, that rare is the
day when a thunderous roar does not reverberate over the city telling
that the “Blue” or “Green” jockeys have won, or a favorite gladiator
has plunged home his trident.
[Illustration: AT THE THEATER ENTRANCE. _After Von
Falke._]
=319. Expenses of Public Spectacles to Great Officials.=--Naturally
the cost of these contests is enormous. The presidency and supervision
of them is distributed around among the magistrates, with the chief
glories and burdens falling usually upon the consuls and prætors.[202]
The State gives each official a respectable sum to pay for the
spectacles, but this falls far short of the actual cost. The glory of
presiding in the central box at the Flavian Amphitheater or Circus
Maximus is so great that a magistrate is bound to sacrifice a good
share of his entire patrimony in order to make a fine display, to win
the “Ave!” of the populace, and to hold up his head among his noble
rivals. When Hadrian was prætor, his kinsman, Trajan the Emperor, gave
him personally 4,000,000 sesterces ($160,000) towards the cost of those
games which the prætorship demanded.
Our Publius Calvus, with no imperial connection, deliberately saved
and economized for years prior to his elevation to the prætorship,
and during his term of office he spent almost as much energy in
corresponding with a friend who was legatus of Numidia to get African
leopards, and negotiating with certain racing interests to secure a
very desirable jockey, as he did in settling a certain great lawsuit
before his tribunal. One good set of chariot races can cost 400,000
sesterces ($16,000), and some of Calvus’s richer colleagues have found
the prætors’ games coming to a dozen times as much. He congratulated
himself, therefore, on getting out of office for about half their
outlay; as it was he had to live very sparingly for the next two years,
and sell off a villa.[203]
=320. Indescribable Popularity of the Games.=--Everybody in Rome
attends the games. Once slaves were forbidden to be present, but that
law had broken down several generations ago. Few are the masters that
risk the unpopularity of refusing to let their familia frequent at
least the more famous contests. The waiting litter bearers, the idling
foot-boys, all the parasitical menials about the great mansions discuss
every coming event most frantically and wager all the coppers which
their masters give them upon the outcome, and their zeal is matched by
the ragged plebeians who infest the fetid insulæ, or sleep under the
porticoes.
Seemingly half of Rome exists only from one chariot or gladiator
exhibition to another. Every contest is a display of social
importance. The front seats are assigned to the magistrates, who occupy
curule chairs in the order of their rank; there are other seats of
honor for the senators, others directly behind them for the equites. If
the Emperor is present, he sits in a special box (_cubiculum_),
which Trajan with democratic condescension caused to be thrown wide
open that all the spectators might see him.
These seats of honor are free, but the great multitude of well-to-do
spectators are expected to purchase tickets for all the better ranges
behind the tiers of the equites.[204] The prices ordinarily are low,
but concerning these tickets there is a complaint not unknown in
another age: that the box-officers (_locarii_) in charge buy up many
reserved seats for the more popular games, then sell them over again
at an outrageous advance. However, behind these reserved seats there
are still a certain number of others thrown open free to the first
comers, and behind these is a wide space where plebeians and slaves can
stand as a gesticulating, shouting, steaming mass, gazing down on the
spectacles below.
=321. The Theater Less Popular than the Circus or Amphitheater.=--The
public exhibitions are three general kinds,--the theatrical
performances, the circus races, and the gladiatorial combats.
For the great masses, the theater can never have the same vulgar appeal
possessed by its two rivals; on the other hand some men of intelligence
and rank do not hesitate to dismiss the latter as “for the mob” and
affect a great contempt for charioteers and “Thracians.” Even the most
sophisticated Romans, however, never are true Athenians. Tragedies
dealing with profound human problems, such as won trophies for Æschylus
and Sophocles, would fall absolutely flat beside the Tiber.[205]
There is even a growing distaste for the better kind of comedies.
What delights the Roman audience in the theater most is some kind of
elaborate horseplay.
[Illustration: THEATER AT POMPEII.]
The stage as a rule is long and narrow, some 120 by 24 feet, and is
raised only about three feet above the orchestra where a chorus can
dance and parade.[206] The rear of the stage has a fixed background
painted to represent the front of a palace; it is pierced by three
doors, and is adorned with columns and niches for the inevitable
statues of the Muses, of Apollo, and of like deities. A large curtain,
not dropped from above but rolled up from the bottom, can uncover the
most amazing spectacles upon this stage. Long ago Horace complained
of how a Roman audience would depart discontented if the play did not
require in its middle “either a bear or a boxing match.” For four hours
and more the curtain is “kept down” while “squadrons of horse and
bodies of foot are seen flying, while luckless kings with hands tied
behind their backs and chariots of all kinds and even ships go hurrying
along, and while spoils of ivory and Corinthian brass are borne by in
state.”
There are, however, two kinds of performances more certain to crowd the
theater than these very cheap spectacular plays--they are the mimes and
pantomimes.
=322. The Mimes: Character Plays.=--The mimes are a native Latin
product, although they have a certain kinship with the Greek “New
Comedy.” They are character plays of everyday life without the actors’
masks and buskins; and they are always coarse, vulgar, and in the
nature of roaring farces. The language is often exceedingly gross
and the situations frequently match the language. The actors wear a
kind of harlequin costume, extremely grotesque, and along with the
chief _mimus_, who takes the leading part, there is usually a second
actor who draws thunderous applause from the upper benches. He is the
_strepidus_ or _parasitus_, a kind of pantaloon, a clown with puffed
cheeks and shaven head, who has to stand a great amount of boisterous
slapping from the chief actor.
Other parts can be taken by women, who are forbidden to appear on the
stage in “legitimate” tragedy and comedy. Often the dances and postures
of these actresses are indescribably vulgar, and their reputation for
easy conduct is too well established. For all that, their presence
brings unsteady youths to the theaters like flies, and affairs with
actresses are quite normal things with a type of young bloods. Once
Cicero was defending a free and easy client, a certain Plancus. “He’s
accused of having run off with an actress?” declared the advocate. “Why
_that’s_ just an amusement excellently sanctioned by custom!”
The stories portrayed by the mimes correspond with their general
character:--a robber chief befooling the clumsy constables sent to
take him, a lover surprised by the return of a jealous husband and
forced to hide in a large box, a beggar who suddenly stumbles into a
fortune, a descent into the world of ghosts, episodes revolving around
the introduction of a very clever trained dog, etc. Some of the acting
is of high order, but there are few mimes which do not abound in lines
and situations extremely gross,--for all that the open-air theaters are
packed from morn until sunset.
=323. The Pantomimes: Their Real Art.=--All considered, the pantomimes
represent a higher degree of art. Here we have only one actor, who,
with the aid of a chorus and a great orchestra of lutes and lyres,
undertakes to tell a whole story merely by his dancing and rhythmic
motions. A really great _pantomimus_ wins and deserves the favor of
highly cultivated aristocrats. Pylades and Bathyllus in Augustus’s day
had the fashionable world practically at their feet, and Paris was one
of the prime intimates of Nero.
The greater the skill the fewer the words that need to be spoken; the
chanting of the chorus while the pantomimus is changing his costumes
giving hint enough of the characters he is portraying. The music,
florid and descriptive, keeps the audience in mood for the dancing.
All sorts of subjects can thus be portrayed, including those of old
Greek tragedies, the actor slipping from one character to another with
consummate art:--now he is Agamemnon, now Clytemnestra, now Orestes.
He can take male or female parts alternately, delineate the deepest
passions, and tell a whole story with what his admirers call his
“speaking hands,” and his “eloquence of dancing.”
To see a great pantomimus, clad perhaps in fleshings of soft light
red Canunian wool, setting off perfectly his graceful figure, dance
through the story of how Achilles disguised as a maiden was discovered
by Ulysses and summoned away to the Trojan War, is a joy to the most
sophisticated and intellectual. The dancer can take many parts--the
fair youth concealed in the palace of Lycomedes, the embassy of Ulysses
and Diomedes, the young warrior betraying himself by his interest in
the helmet and cuirass concealed in the mass of gifts intended for
women;--the whole impersonation in short may be wonderful.
Not all the dances, however, are so innocent. Many of the coarsest
stories in Græco-Roman mythology are acted out on the stage, and the
grosser they are often the louder the applause of the groundlings.
Nevertheless, the leading pantomimi rightly have the entrée to lordly
houses, enjoy great incomes, and are among the most admired personages
in Rome. They are outdistanced, however, by two sets of more vulgar
rivals--the charioteers and the gladiators.
=324. Extreme Popularity of the Circus.=--When a series of superior
contests is announced for the Circus all Rome seems to become racing
mad. Words fail to describe the excitement, the tense discussion of
the charioteers and their fours, the wave of betting from the inner
Palatine to the most sordid insula, and then the exuberant joy or
immoderate grief over the results.
Superior folk try in vain to appear disdainful of these contests.
Thus Pliny the Younger has recorded his deep disgust that “so many
thousands of men should be eager, like a pack of children, to see
horses running time after time with the charioteers bending over their
cars.” “The multitude,” he asserted, “were not interested in the
speed of the teams or the skill of the drivers, but solely in the
‘_racing colors_.’” “If in the middle of the race (he added) the
colors were changed, the enthusiasm of the spectators would change with
them, and they would suddenly desert the drivers and horses whom they
now recognized afar and whose names they shouted aloud. Such is the
influence and authority vested in one cheap tunic!”
=325. Popular Charioteers (_Aurigæ_): the Great Racing Factions.=--It
is all very well to write this, but neither Pliny nor anybody else
can prevent the greatest charioteers from enjoying temporary incomes
surpassing those of a majority of the senators. Many of these lucky
_aurigæ_ are Moors, dark-skinned, hawk-eyed rascals, with sharp white
teeth and sinews of iron; but a considerable sprinkling of them are
Spaniards, as was that Diocles, whose heirs proudly recorded on his
tombstone that in a professional career of twenty-four years he drove
in 4257 races, and conquered 1462 times, with total winnings of nearly
36 million sesterces (say $1,440,000). He, however, was not the most
fortunate--there are drivers on record who boast of at least 3500
victories, though, of course, many of these were probably won in the
provinces.
No sport will ever be more thoroughly standardized and professionalized
than that of the chariot races in Rome. When a magistrate or other
seeker for applause decides to give a series of contests he appeals to
the great circus syndicates (“factions”). There were originally only
the Red and the White; then the Blue and the Green have been added, and
finally the Purple and the Gold. Each faction maintains huge racing
stables with expert drivers, grooms, trainers, and veterinaries, as
well as many superb “fours” of horses.
The donor of the games has to arrange with these organizations how
many contests he will require, each “faction” entering a chariot in
each race. Ten races a day is the minimum; twenty-four the ordinary
maximum. After the contracts have been signed and the programs posted
all over the city, anxious days follow for all concerned to insure an
honest race. The wagering is always so general and so reckless, that
infinite precautions are needful to keep the horses from being drugged,
the drivers from being bribed to throw the contests, or (if they prove
incorruptible) the charioteers from being poisoned enough to make them
lose. The tricks of the race-track will simply endure across the ages.
=326. The Circus Maximus.=--After such preparations and excitement
no wonder that people complain that the Circus Maximus is sometimes too
small. This long narrow depression between the Palatine and Aventine
has provided an excellent natural race course since the days of the
Tarquins. At first the slopes of the hills were simply lined with crude
wooden benches. By Julius Cæsar’s time many of these benches were made
of stone, and in all could seat at least 150,000 spectators. After a
great fire in 36 A.D. Claudius presently rebuilt the whole
structure so there are now seats, partly of marble and partly of wood;
and Trajan added still more tiers and more marble ornaments. At present
the Circus Maximus covers the enormous area of 600 by 2000 feet, and
it is declared that there is at least standing room, if not seats, for
385,000 spectators--a good fraction of the entire adult population of
Rome.[207]
=327. The Race-Track: Procession before the Races.=--Inasmuch as horse
races are not peculiar to the Imperial Age let a brief description
of the Great Circus and its contests suffice. The long reaches of
seats are, of course, portioned off to give the senators and equites
the coigns of vantage. There is a lofty imperial box (_pulvinar_) on
the northern side leading directly down from the Palatine. Here the
Emperor and his suite can refresh themselves, and from a wide terrace
command a marvelous view over the long area of the immense hippodrome.
[Illustration: CIRCUS MAXIMUS. _Restoration by
Spandoni._]
Down the center of this area runs its central “backbone” (_spina_),
forming a long low wall separating the outward and inward tracks,
adorned with an unusually elaborate set of statues, columns upholding
trophies, and even with one or two tapering obelisks imported from
Egypt. In a kind of open pavilion at either end of the spina can be
seen seven huge marble eggs and as many marble dolphins. One of each of
these will be removed as each lap is finished, there being seven laps
normally in every race.
The great yellow race-track on gala occasions can be sprinkled with
some powerful perfumes, and with glittering particles of mica or with
red lead. When at last the multitudes have gathered, the contestants
enter in solemn procession by the Triumphal Gate at the extreme eastern
end of the Circus, and ahead of the array of chariots first of all
there goes the magistrate giving the games, himself in a magnificent
car and surrounded by a brilliant hedge of attendants on horse and
foot. Very likely he is then followed by certain priestly colleges in
pontifical vestments, by statues of deities piously borne on gilded
litters, by bands of trumpeters and harpists raising their clangor, and
then last, but not least, come the racing cars themselves.
=328. Beginning a Race in the Circus.=--The master of the games takes
his seat in the _podium_, the center of the reserved benches near
the end of the track. The chariots disappear in the great line of
_carceres_, “prison houses,” the carefully closed stalls at the western
end of the Circus. After due waiting, fidgeting, chattering, wagering
along the mountainous slopes of the benches, all the trumpets blow
together. Silence for an instant grips the tens of thousands, while the
president rises in his lodge and waves out a broad _mappa_, a white
cloth visible far up and down the entire circus.
Instantly the doors of the carceres fly open; the six chariots[208]
dash forth at full bound. The aurigæ, in tight-fitting tunics of the
colors of their factions, stand erect in the light cars, the reins
looped around their waists, snapping the loose ends over the flying
horses. Instantly they have dashed to the three tall pillars of the
nearer goal (_meta_), and only by miraculous chance is a disastrous
collision avoided at the outset. Then the whole circus rises and shouts
together. The familiar figure of Scorpus the Moor, a brown giant in the
tunic of the Greens, shoots ahead. His magnificent _quadriga_ of bays
have taken the wall at one leap. The flying dust cloud, as the other
five cars dash after him, almost dims the sight of the race. The noise
from the benches is deafening. The backers of the trailing cars are in
an agony.
=329. Perils of the Races; Proclaiming the Victors.=--Scorpus’s chariot
whirls around the lower goal like lightning and comes tearing back on
the opposite track, while each one of the balls and dolphins is removed
to indicate the progress of the race. The other cars press hard; and
as the teams gather speed it is a marvel how the drivers keep their
stand with the cars leaping hither and thither under them, their wheels
barely touching the flying track.[209]
Five times around they go, with Scorpus gallantly maintaining his lead.
Then at the sixth turn the “Gold” driver reins too sharply. His chariot
crashes over in a complete somersault, but, by a desperate maneuver
just as he is thrown, he whips out the knife held ready in his belt and
cuts the reins about his waist. By a miracle he is flung out sprawling
upon the yielding sands, yet escapes death under the car racing just
behind. The spectators, therefore, escape the brutal and familiar sight
of an auriga trampled or crushed to death by the rushing chariots and
horses. Meantime Scorpus losing not an instant has hurried again past
the upper goal; a frantic attempt by Cresconius, the “Red” driver just
behind, fails to head his steeds, and amid a deafening tumult he sweeps
past the president of the games to victory.
The official _jubilatores_ immediately stride out into the track
crying with loud voice the name of the winner, and the news is soon
flying all over the city. Nay, some of the outlying towns are speedily
informed of the general results, for a certain sports-loving senator
has come with a cage of homing pigeons, each colored to match one of
the factions. The instant Scorpus is acclaimed, green pigeons are
released to tell all the gamblers in Ostia and Præneste that the
“Green” cars have won the first round.
[Illustration: RACE IN THE CIRCUS MAXIMUS.]
After the noise has subsided, the trumpets blow again, another set of
chariots is ready and the whole excitement is repeated. So the contests
keep up through the day. If there is a long interval between the
races, rope-dancers, acrobats, and trick-riders are ready to amuse the
populace. Probably at the end there will be the crowning and decisive
race between the winners of the preceding contests. If Scorpus can
triumph in this also, he will carouse with his companions, doubtless
more praised and fêted for one glad night than even the Emperor.
=330. Gladiatorial Contests Even More Popular than the Circus.=--Yet
Scorpus with all his adulation and ephemeral wealth turns green with
jealousy toward a rival for fame--the victorious gladiator in the last
combats in the Flavian. The sports of the arena perhaps excite greater
favor with the mob, betting more reckless, passions more frantic than
do even the contests of the Circus.
The gladiatorial games are peculiar to Roman civilization; nothing
exactly like them will follow in later ages.[210] They illustrate
completely the pitiless spirit and carelessness of human life lurking
behind the pomp, glitter, and cultural pretensions of the great
imperial age. True it is that persons of intellectual tastes sometimes
affect greater contempt for these contests than they do for the Circus.
“No doubt the gladiators,” such men as Seneca write to one another,
“are criminals deserving their fate, but what have _you_ done to
deserve being compelled to witness their last agonies?” No matter;
nothing will gain “popularity” for a ruler or for a magnate sooner than
announcing a fight in the arena.
The very best Emperors arrange elaborate series of combats--perhaps
with a sigh in their hearts, as colossal and bloody bribes which must
be thrown constantly to the mob; and Imperator, great officials,
senators, priests, nay, the Vestal Virgins themselves, will all be
on hand in the reserved front benches. There is even given out a
philosophical justification for the butcheries, namely, that the
spectators become hardened to the sight of death and are, therefore,
the more courageous when their own hour comes. The reigning Hadrian
considers the arena combats to be useful also for keeping up the
military spirit; in short the whole Latin half of the Empire delights
in them, although they never have become very popular in the Greek
portion.[211]
=331. Gladiator Fights at Funerals.=--Gladiatorial fights claim an
Etruscan origin, and in Rome they were first exhibited at funerals of
the great, possibly with the idea that the spirits of the slain would
serve the dead lord in the underworld. It is still very fashionable
to give a sizable gladiator fight as the aftermath of any pretentious
funeral, but this is perhaps more common in the provincial towns than
in Rome, where the government likes to control such martial spectacles.
We actually hear of the populace of one small city that would not
let the funeral procession of a distinguished lady proceed through
the gates until her husband had promised them some public combats.
Pliny the Younger’s friend Maximus presented a gladiator fight to the
citizens of Verona “in honor of his most estimable wife,” a native
of the place, but the exhibition was not quite a success because “on
account of bad weather the numerous African panthers he had bought
failed to arrive on the expected day.”
=332. Gladiator “Schools” (_Ludi_): Inmates Usually Criminals.=--There
are four great imperial “schools” (_ludi_) of gladiators in Rome
maintained as public institutions. These can be drawn upon for the
regular public games; but there are plenty of private “schools”
maintained by speculators who can often supply quite as good fighters.
If, as a magistrate, or as a bereaved kinsman or widower, you decide
to give some combats, and if your purse is full, the rest is easy. You
merely contract with the _lanista_ (keeper and trainer of a school) for
so many contests upon specified terms; although, in really pretentious
affairs, gladiators from several rival schools can be pitted
together--this adds to the excitement. When the fight is over the free
gladiators are paid off, the slave fighters are returned to their
owners and indemnification is given the owners of the slain--all on set
business terms. There is great expense in training good gladiators and
slain champions cannot fight again; and this solid fact often prevents
combats from being _too_ destructive, while wounded survivors may be
carefully nursed just as a sick race horse may be cared for.
Anybody will tell us that no pity need be wasted on gladiators. Many a
low-born criminal is dragged from the præfect’s court with a relieved
grin on his felonious countenance; the magistrate has not ordered “To
the cross with him!” but merely “Train him for the amphitheater.” Many
an incorrigible slave has been sold to a lanista by his master instead
of being promptly whipped to death.
Not a few unfortunate prisoners of war and kidnapped persons, however,
if they have stout physiques, find their way also to the lanistæ
instead of to the ordinary slave markets, and brutal masters will
sometimes sell perfectly innocent slaves if the latter appear likely
to make good swordsmen. On the other hand many plebeians of the baser
sort are caught by the glitter and glory of the arena, and submit
voluntarily to the discipline of the “schools,” while under the
tyrannous emperors even men claiming noble rank have fought upon the
sands to truckle to the whims of an evil Cæsar.
=333. Severe Training of Gladiators; Their Ephemeral Glory.=--The
lanistæ’s discipline is terribly severe, as is perhaps needful
considering the wretches placed under it. The gladiators are kept in
prison-like barracks. Nothing is omitted to brutalize them and to make
their whole life center around mere skill with their weapons. They are
fed upon great quantities of meat. Cruel floggings follow the least
breach of discipline, and in every _ludus_ is a lock-up, with a long
line of stocks and shackles, which never wants its many occupants.
On the other hand many a stupid wretch is made to forget the doom
probably awaiting him in the next combats, by dreaming of the glories
promised a truly successful gladiator. If he can emerge victorious from
a series of combats, he is more talked of than even the most daring
charioteer; great nobles will visit his quarters to watch his training
and feel of his muscles; his owners will do everything to pamper
such a valuable piece of property; innumerable women, even among the
silken-robed _clarissimæ_, will dote upon him; and perhaps he can
actually elope with a senator’s wife.
Not merely the youths but all the girls in Rome will sing the
champion’s praises and dream of his valor. He will be named in
countless wall-scribblings as “The Maiden’s Sigh,” “The Glory of the
Girls,” “The Lord of the Lasses,” or “The Doctor (_medicus_) of the
Little Darlings.”[212] If he has lost an ear, if his face is one mass
of disfiguring scars, the women run after him all the more. “Never mind
_that_,” scolds Juvenal, “he is a gladiator.”
The end of this glory ordinarily comes speedily and tragically, but
sometimes the very fortunate and skilful fighter will win such favor
that, at the popular demand, the giver of the games will present him
with a wooden sword--the token of honorable discharge. If he is not a
slave-criminal, he can now quit the _ludus_ with plenty of money and a
merry life before him, but the taint of his “profession” will always
stick to him. He can never become a Roman citizen, much less can he be
enrolled as an eques whatever the extent of his wealth.
=334. Normal Arrangements for an Arena Contest.=--Strictly speaking the
amphitheater is used for two kinds of entertainments--wild beast hunts
(_venationes_) and direct combats between men. Each form is extremely
popular, although human gore appears a little cheap and ordinary
compared with that of an expensive tiger, panther, or lion. It always
makes a hit with the crowd to turn, for example, a tigress and a fierce
bull-elephant loose on the sands and watch the two brutes rend one
another.
It is true nevertheless that nothing can really take the place of
a sustained combat between two thoroughly trained pupils of the
“schools.” Ordinarily the management will have the hunts in the morning
at the amphitheater and the human contests in the afternoon. That will
send the myriads away happily satiated after a day spent amid the
perpetual sniff of gore.
No scene visited in our prolonged “day” in Rome can be more repellent
to non-Roman tastes than that of the amphitheater, but to complete the
picture it must not be omitted, although horrid deeds will be dismissed
with few words and still less of moralizing. Publius Calvus’s friend,
Decimus Cluentius, this year is Prætor. He is a wealthy senator and has
been saving money carefully for “his games.” He has already made a good
public impression by his program of races in the Circus; now he will
“add to the luster of his fame” by a day of contests in the Flavian.
Already the notice writers have distributed the list of the gladiators
that he has engaged, in every eating-house and wine-room in the city.
The impression thus made has been excellent: “Cluentius is living up
to his riches. Many of his gladiators are freemen--the finest blades,
no running away, the kind of fellows that will stand right up and be
butchered in mid-arena. Besides, he’s been lucky enough to get from the
præfect a farm steward who was caught insulting his master’s wife--a
good dinner for the lions. These fights won’t be as when that miserly
Norbanus exhibited--his gladiators were such a cowardly, feeble lot
they’d have fallen flat if you breathed on ’em.”[213]
=335. The Flavian Amphitheater (Later “Colosseum”).=--Such an
exhibition can only be held in the Flavian Amphitheater, the vast
structure known to later ages as the “Colosseum.” In Republican days
gladiator fights were held in the open Forum or in the Circus, but
these were ill-adapted for the purpose. To see the fine points of the
combats the audience must be concentrated around the contestants as
closely as possible; hence the “amphitheater”--an immense oval of seats
looking down upon a central arena.
The building of such a quantity of seats out of permanent materials is
very expensive and wooden structures were largely used until about 70
A.D., when Vespasian and Titus began their vast “Flavian” (dedicated
in 80 A.D. by an enormous beast hunt), now among the chief wonders of
Rome. Common report has it that thousands of Titus’s Jewish captives
had to toil first on the masonry and then for the most part to lose
their lives fighting one another in the opening games.
To avoid prolixity any description of this vast structure must be very
brief: it stands an oval cylinder, its outer major diameter 620 feet;
and the greatest diameter of its inner arena 287. Its innumerable
blocks of travertine are bound together by metal clamps; the exterior
is faced with marble and adorned with hundreds more of those statues
which populate Rome. The structure rises 157 feet in four stories. The
lower three of these tiers are composed each of a series of eighty
arches backed by piers. In the first story the flanking columns are
Doric, the second Ionic, the third Corinthian. The fourth story has
no arches but merely windows and pilasters of the “composite” order.
Between these upper pilasters project stone brackets which hold lofty
wooden masts for the great awnings that stretch over the arena. These
masts and awnings (red, blue, and yellow) when spread out under a
brilliant sky, make the Flavian look somewhat like an enormous galley
under a cloud of sail--the effect, of course, being heightened by the
sheen of the marbles of the exterior and the garish paint and gilding
covering the statues.
[Illustration: FLAVIAN AMPHITHEATER (COLOSSEUM):
exterior, present state.]
=336. Exterior and Ticket Entrances to the Flavian
Amphitheater.=--Outside of the Amphitheater is a wide circular area
whereon converge many thoroughfares. This open space is scattered
with huckster’s booths and with small ticket stands much like those
around many amusement places in another age.[214] Here one can place
wagers, purchase programs for the day, obtain food to consume between
the events, and very probably buy or hire cushions in case the stone
benches prove too hard.
Also on the outside and close to the foot of the main structure runs
a high wooden palisade. This is to aid in controlling the crowds. You
go in at one or two entrances, showing your tickets, then circle the
masonry until you reach one of the staircases, located under every
fourth arch, and next you can promptly mount to your reserved seat in
one of the seventy-six sub-sections (_cunei_).
=337. Interior Arrangements of the Flavian.=--Once inside, the
admirable arrangements of the structure impress the visitor no less
than its enormous mass. Everything converges upon the central arena;
even from the topmost seats one can see all the details of the contests
below. The seats are divided into three great terraces, so easily
accessible by the stairways and corridors that the fifty thousand
spectators can pass in and out with the minimum of confusion. The
lowest tiers, made of marble and comfortably cushioned, are reserved
here as elsewhere for the senators; and for the _editor_ (the
giver of the contests), his fellow magistrates, the chief priests,
and the Vestal Virgins, there are seats of peculiar honor directly
upon the _podium_, the crest of the twelve-foot wall girding the
arena;--seats which are protected alike from chance missiles and from
the leap of desperate beasts by a heavy trellis-work of gilded metal.
Above this podium like the billows of a frozen ocean rise the enormous
tiers of masonry seats; first those for the equites, then the great
mass for the paying spectators, then the space crowded with wooden
benches for the slaves and least select plebeians. An open gallery
runs around the entire summit of the benches and here alone, by a
restriction doubtless often lamented, women are allowed to watch the
contests from afar, unless they are Vestal Virgins or ladies of the
Imperial family, with the special privilege of the podium.
All the arches, stairways, sections, and tiers are numbered. If you
have a ticket, it may read “VIth section (_cuneus_), lowest row, seat
No. 18,” marked upon a round or flat piece of bone. The attendants are
lynx-eyed for impostors, but legitimate visitors are quickly seated.
A detachment of sailors from the fleet of Misenum shifts the enormous
awnings so that the thousands[215] can sit comfortably in the shade
while a full blaze of sunlight falls on the arena.
By the middle of the morning the multitudes are in place; Cluentius
the Prætor, with full official magnificence, is in the central box of
the podium; and strong detachments of Prætorians have been quietly
distributed in certain half-concealed guard inclosures near the lower
railing--for gladiators _have_ been known to mutiny and desperate
lions can leap very high.
=338. Procession of Gladiators.=--Presently now trumpets and cymbals
announce the procession which files through one of the four gates
leading directly into the arena. The gladiators, some forty in number,
march two and two, nearly naked save for their glistening armor;
knitted foreheads, white teeth, wolfish scowls, magnificent physiques
are displayed by all of them. From far up the applauding benches they
can be recognized, and many favorite _retiarii_ and _Thraces_ are met
with a storm of cheering.
The company marches solemnly down the arena led by an enormous lanista,
one of their trainers, the scarred hero of all the youth of Rome.
Before Cluentius on the podium they halt and flourish their weapons
defiantly. Everybody knows that they have just taken their fearful oath
“to be bound, to be burned, to be scourged, to be slain, and to endure
all else required of them as proper gladiators, giving up alike their
souls and their bodies.”[216]
=339. Throwing a Criminal to the Beasts. The Animal Hunt.=--However,
the contests do not begin immediately; there is a preliminary spectacle
in store. The Prætor’s friend, the City Præfect, most luckily has
handed over to him a vicious freedman caught maltreating his patron’s
lady. The wretch, of course, deserves death:--how proper, therefore,
that he can be made to amuse more honest folk by his very exit! Into
the middle of the arena they lead him, a pitiful gibbering object,
half-dead already with fright. The guards strike off his fetters,
thrust a cheap sword into his hands, and themselves hastily retire into
one of the numerous caged chambers lining the arena. A tense stillness
for an instant holds the Flavian.
Suddenly the rattle of chains is heard. In the very center of the sands
(part of which are over wooden substructures) the arena opens; a cage
appears lifted by pulleys, and then is opened by some mechanism. Forth
bounds a tawny lion, lashing his tail and growling with hunger and
rage. The unskilled victim has been given a sword with the vain promise
that if he can actually kill the lion his own life will be spared. His
chances are infinitesimal, but a few desperadoes have thus actually
saved themselves.
Will the prisoner fight? To the infinite disgust of the thousands he
collapses upon the sands in sheer terror before the lion can so much as
strike him. The beast finishes his life almost instantly. The multitude
hoot and curse--they have been cheated of their passionate desire to
see a human victim struggling in desperate combat with the great beast.
Fortunately, they remind themselves, this is only the beginning of the
performance.
If one need not moralize, one need not linger. After the sacrifice
of the criminal there are more beasts turned loose in the arena. Of
course, no Prætor can be expected to show the hundreds of animals which
an Emperor will exhibit in his greater games, but Cluentius has done
the thing very respectably. He has in all ten bears, eighteen panthers,
five lions, and six tigers.
First the animals are goaded on to fight one with another. A bear is
torn to death by a lion, but kills the lion in a last mortal hug.
Then the trumpet sounds--some of the gladiators rush into the arena.
The arena is now covered with frightened, snarling, reckless beasts.
Even with keen weapons and skill, it is desperate work to slay them.
One fine young German slips as a tiger bounds on him. His life is
crushed out at the very foot of the editor’s stand. One panther, driven
frantic, with a terrific leap almost clears the trellis directly before
a Vestal Virgin; there is a general scream and recoil from the podium
as the luckless beast drops back upon the spear of a hunter.
=340. Interval in the Contests: Scattering of Lottery Tickets.=--At
last the _venatio_ is over. All the beasts have been killed with
reasonable skill, and barring only the German, with no accidents. It
is now noon and a comfortable intermission follows. Food has been
brought by many, or is passed about by hawkers. Cluentius, with great
condescension, remains in the editor’s seat, and dines in public so
that everybody present can go home boasting merrily, “We have been to
prandium with the Prætor!”[217]
After hunger has been appeased the spectators begin to grow restive.
It is the immemorial privilege of the crowds to shout out whatever
they wish in the Circus or Amphitheater. An unpopular Commissioner of
the Grain Supply is seen rising in the podium; instantly the great
awning quakes with the hootings. There is even a volley of date and
olive stones; when, luckily for the Commissioner, the Prætor orders the
attendants to begin scattering lottery tickets along the benches.
[Illustration: BOXERS.]
Instantly all else is forgotten; dignified men scramble over one
another. In the free benches there are several genuine fights and many
a torn toga or lacerna. The winning tickets to-morrow will draw jars of
wine, packages of edibles, or even quite a few denarii in cash; but if
the editor had been the Emperor the prizes could well have been fine
jewelry, pictures, beasts of burden, tidy sums of money, or even--as
the grand prize--a small villa.
This distribution silences all the discordant howlings; and the people
are further amused by a kind of theatrical pageant, some popular
pantomimes giving the Judgment of Paris in a clever and not inelegant
manner, without scenery in the broad arena. After that two ostriches
are unloosed and the crowd is put in an excellent humor while four
Moorish riders on shining desert steeds chase down the speeding,
doubling birds and finally lasso them. All is at last ready for the
real business of the day--the gladiators.
=341. Beginning the Regular Gladiatorial Combats.=--The hunters of the
beasts, duly reënforced by many others, reënter the arena again in grim
procession. Approaching the editor’s seat on the podium they can be
seen passing up their weapons for Cluentius, to let him satisfy himself
that every edge is sharpened beyond the possibility of shamming.
He hands back each spear or sword with a nod, then the long file
straightens and every combatant lifts his right arm: “_Ave, prætor!_”
sounds the deep chant, “_morituri te salutamus!_” “_Ave!_” answers
Cluentius gesturing haughtily. “Low-browed scoundrels,” mutters Calvus
to a fellow senator; “Most of them are lucky to end up this way and to
escape the cross.--Ah! they begin.”
First, however, to get well limbered, wooden swords are handed about,
and the troop fence with one another skilfully yet harmlessly; but
the people are waxing impatient--“Steel! Steel!” rings the shout from
the whole amphitheater, and the dense array of women in the upper
gallery is calling it as fiercely as the men on the ocean of benches.
A terrific blast of trumpets sounds from mid-arena, and a gigantic
lanista acting as a kind of umpire motions with his spear. Soon every
heart in the myriads is thrilled by the clash of weapons.
Cluentius (an unoriginal though free-spending magistrate) has arranged
a very conventional series of combats. First two Britons dash about in
chariots pelting each other with javelins. Their armor turns the darts
for long, then one of the horses is wounded and while his driver is
struggling to control him another missile strikes through a joint in
the warrior’s armor. He totters in the car while all the amphitheater
rises and yells together “_Habet!_” “He’s got it!”--and then as the
poor wight tumbles back into the sands, “_Peractum est!_” “He’s done
for!”
[Illustration: GLADIATORS SALUTING THE EDITOR BEFORE
JOINING IN MORTAL COMBAT.]
Immediately there appears a grotesque figure, arrayed as Charon,
the dead man’s ferryman. He bears a hammer wherewith he strikes the
body of the victim to see if he is counterfeiting death. The fallen
chariot warrior stirs not--and “Charon” with a long hook drags away
the corpse into one of the dens under the podium. The benches are now
leaping, gesticulating, and yelling--the noise is indescribable, and
Cluentius’s friends hasten to tell him that the combats have started
admirably.
=342. Mounted Combats: the Signals for Ruthlessness and Mercy.=--The
surviving charioteer disappears amid plaudits. In his place ride out
four horsemen; and two mounted duels can thus take place at either
side of the arena. One pair contend evenly and stoutly, but the other
contest soon ends--the less skilful rider is dashed from his seat
by his opponent’s sword, and is so hurt he can barely lift himself
upon the sands. The victor leaps down and stands over him waving his
reddened blade, while his disarmed victim in sheer helplessness raises
the right hand, the fist clinched except for one upraised finger--the
demand for “Mercy!”
[Illustration: DEFEATED GLADIATOR APPEALING FOR
MERCY: spectators, with Vestal Virgins in front seats,
turning “thumbs down.”]
The conqueror obsequiously looks toward his employer Cluentius upon
the podium, and the Prætor, bound to be gracious to the populace,
motions somewhat inquiringly toward the spectators--let them decide! If
the defeated gladiator had fought more gamely and had striven to rise
and renew the fight, possibly enough white handkerchiefs--the token
of mercy--would have been waved to warrant the editor in flourishing
his own also;--but the fellow had collapsed too easily and the mood
of the crowd demanded blood. “_Occide! Occide!_” “Kill! Kill!”
is the yell; and thousands of thumbs are ruthlessly pointed downward.
Cluentius’s own thumb is pointed down likewise. The victor raises his
weapon and without scruple plunges it in the breast of the vanquished,
who sustains the honor of his profession by receiving the mortal blow
without flinching.
Again the Charon enters with his hook and clears the arena. In the
interval the other mounted duelists, cool and experienced warriors,
have partly suspended their combat and now they profit through their
comrade’s death by the umpiring lanista’s declaration of a draw. The
people are sated for an instant and Cluentius nods approval as the two
ride out; he is inwardly glad to spare them, because the owners of dead
gladiators have to be indemnified.
=343. Combats between Netters (_Retiarii_) and Heavy-Armed Warriors
(Thracians).=--So combat follows combat, while the sands grow red and
one warrior falls simply by slipping upon the gore. The suffocating
fumes of blood rise through the bars of sunlight under the great
awning. The people grow more and more excited. There will be hundreds
of beggars to-night in Rome on account of the reckless wagering.
At last the trumpets sound for what is always the crowning feature of
the exhibition--the chief thing which the multitudes have really waited
all day to see--ten _retiarii_ are to fight ten “Thracians.” The
retiarii (“netters”) wear not the least armor. They carry nothing but
three-pronged lances and thick nets, which last they endeavor to
fling over their adversaries, entangle them, and then stab with their
tridents ere they can cut loose. The “Thracians” have heavy suits of
armor and formidable swords.[218] If a netter misses his cast, there
is nothing for him to do but to fly for dear life. The sight of a
powerful, armed Thracian toiling after the leaping, dodging retiarius
is a source of universal joy to the amphitheaters. The people rise
on the benches and join in a kind of intoxication and blood orgy.
“_Verbera! Verbera! Occide! Occide!_” “Lay on! Kill!”--rises as a
thunder to heaven.
=344. End of the Combats: Rewarding the Victors.=--It profits not
to dwell on the half hour which follows. Plenty of skill, valor, and
swiftness are shown alike by netters and by heavy-armed warriors. One
by one part of the twenty drop, and for a while the passions of the
people permit no mercy. The Charon appears several times; but there is
a young Spanish netter whose nimbleness and reckless courage win great
favor, and many are muttering, “We want to see him again.” There is
also a very experienced Thracian whose owner will demand from Cluentius
a round indemnity, if the fight is pushed to a finish and his precious
chattel is slain.
As a result when four wounded men together drop their weapons and
signal for mercy, white handkerchiefs begin waving all over the
amphitheater and Cluentius is glad to shake out his also. The combats
are over. The victorious gladiators, if they are unhurt enough to
stand, are led before the podium and to each are handed palms of
victory.
There is furthermore a crowning ceremony. One Certus, a very famous
netter, has by previous understanding taken only a formal part in
the combats. Now, while the whole multitude leaps up to acclaim him,
Cluentius himself rises and gives him the wooden sword--the sign that
he need fight and risk his life no more. Henceforth Certus will become
himself no doubt a _lanista_, and train hundreds of other brawny
youths to yield up their lives for the amusement of Rome.
The amphitheater empties from all its numerous _vomitoria_. The
crowd goes home well contented, praising Cluentius and hoping he will
be assigned a fine province to govern. True it has not been as if the
Emperor were present--then there might have been two hundred or more
gladiators, an enormous slaughter of beasts; fountains could have
played in the arena to refresh the air, and perfumes could have been
scattered from the awnings; or the arena might easily have been flooded
for a sea fight between two squadrons of small galleys.
Nevertheless, Cluentius has done very well for a mere Prætor; and he
will have to pay indemnity for about fourteen of his forty gladiators,
a very fair average to get butchered. “It has been a pleasant enough
holiday (say many) in a toiling and busy world, and the rumor goes that
for the next Ides at the Consul’s games they have rounded up a whole
gang of robbers who will all be fed to the lions!”