Gladiators were men who fought each other in front of crowds of
cheering Romans. While at first gladiators were prisoners of war
and slaves, eventually professional fighters, freeman, and women
also joined the gladiator ranks. The Romans were not the first
to engage in this blood sport, they borrowed the idea from funeral
rites performed by the Etruscans, and modified them into a form
of public entertainment. The Romans staged the first of these
games in 264 BC and thereafter they continued to grow in popularity.
In fact, the games became so lavish that a large scale production
put on by Julius Caesar featured over 300 fighters and led to
the enactment of limits on the number of fighters by the Roman
Senate.
These deadly contests took place in huge open air buildings called
amphitheaters. The most famous of these, the Colosseum in Rome,
opened in AD 80. It took over ten years to build, and could seat
over 50,000 people. The Colosseum held fights pitting gladiator
against gladiator, as well as gladiator against beasts such as
alligators and lions. Tunnels, corridors, and ramps were built
under the arena in order to transport the animals and hidden trap
doors released them onto the stage for combat. At one time, the
Colosseum was flooded in order to stage naval battles between
ships!
In this mini unit study, you can: read more about life as a gladiator,
learn about the different types of gladiatorial games, read about
a new discovery as to what a gladiator's diet was, dress a gladiator
for battle, take a tour inside and view photos of the Colosseum,
watch videos of the building of the Colosseum and the ancient
sea battles once staged inside, work on an electronic jigsaw puzzle
of the Colosseum, and create a poster to advertise the games.
Reading
Take a walk through the life of a Roman gladiator in this cleverly
illustrated web book:
After you have mastered the facts about Roman gladiators, imagine
you have been tasked to create an advertising campaign for the
upcoming gladiatorial games in the year 100 AD. The emperor Trajan
is spending great sums of money to put on these games and he is
looking for your help in attracting people.
Using poster board,
create a poster or a series of posters that announce the competition.
Be sure to include where and when the games will be held and feature
either some of the types of games or you can create a legendary
gladiator to feature - use your imagination! Use felt markers,
photos printed from the web or cut from the pages of magazines,
paint, and whatever else you can think of.
Recommended
Resource
See You Later, Gladiator
See You Later, Gladiator
by Jon Scieszka, is a book in the popular Time Warp Trio
series. Once again, Joe, Sam, and Fred, are whisked back in time
through the green mist. In this adventure, the travelers are propelled
to ancient Rome. Through gladiator training school and into the
Colosseum, they face a tremendous challenge in an amphitheater
filled with thousands of spectators. The trio participate in a
Roman feast, hide out in a steamy Roman bath, and end up romping
through the forbidden Temple of Vesta before their return home.
The historical details of See You Later, Gladiator are
easily woven into the adventure and are balanced with humor. It
is not necessary to have read any other books in this series to
enjoy See You Later, Gladiator. It is a nice fictional
selection for ages 9-12 to accompany the study of ancient Rome
- this is also the book we provide a literature study guide for
in the "Ancient Rome" issue of Learning Through
History magazine.
