The inferiority of the Romans to the Greeks in intellectual acquirements, was no where more conspicuous than in their public amusements. While the refined Grecians sought to gratify their taste by music, the fine arts, and dramatic entertainments, the Romans derived their chief pleasure from contemplating the brutal and bloody fights of gladiators; or at best, such rich shows and processions as gratify the uneducated vulgar. The games in the circus, with which the Romans were so delighted, that they considered them of equal importance, with the necessaries of life, consisted of athletic exercises, such as boxing, racing, [Pg. 56]wrestling, and gladiatorial combats. To these, chariot-racing was added under the emperors, and exhibitions of combats between wild beasts, and, in numerous instances, between men and beasts.
2. After the establishment of the naval power of Rome, naumachiæ, or naval combats, were frequently exhibited in circi built for the purpose. These were not always sham fights; the contests were, in many instances, real engagements displaying all the horrors of a sanguinary battle.
3. The custom of exhibiting shows of gladiators, originated in the barbarous sacrifices of human beings, which prevailed in remote ages. In the gloomy superstition of the Romans, it was believed that the manes, or shades of the dead, derived pleasure from human blood, and they therefore sacrificed, at the tombs of their ancestors, captives taken in war, or wretched slaves. It was soon found that sport to the living might be combined with this horrible offering to the dead; and instead of giving up the miserable victims to the executioner, they were compelled to fight with each other, until the greater part was exterminated.
4. The pleasure that the people derived from this execrable amusement, induced the candidates for office to gratify, them frequently with this spectacle. The exhibitions were no longer confined to funerals; they formed an integrant part of every election, and were found more powerful than merit in opening a way to office. The utter demoralization of the Roman people, and the facility with which the tyranny of the emperors was established, unquestionably was owing, in a great degree to the pernicious prevalence of these scandalous exhibitions.
5. To supply the people with gladiators, schools were, established in various parts of Italy, each under the controul of a lanis'ta, or fencing-master, who instructed them in martial exercises. The victims were either prisoners of war, or refractory slaves, sold by their masters; but in the degenerate ages of the empire, freemen, and even senators, ventured their lives on the stage along with the regular gladiators. Under the mild and merciful influence of Christianity these combats were abolished, and human blood was no longer shed to gratify a cruel and sanguinary populace.
6. So numerous were the gladiators, that Spar'tacus, one of their number, having escaped from a school, raised an army of his fellow-sufferers, amounting to seventy thousand men; he was finally subdued by Cras'sus, the colleague of[Pg. 57] Pompey. Ju'lius Cæsar, during his ædileship, exhibited at one time three hundred and twenty pairs of gladiators; but even this was surpassed by the emperor Trajan, who displayed no less than one thousand.
7. The gladiators were named from their peculiar arms; the most common were the retiarius, who endeavoured to hamper his antagonist with a net; and his opponent the secutor.
8. When a gladiator was wounded, or in any way disabled, he fled to the extremity of the stage, and implored the pity of the spectators; if he had shown good sport, they took him under their protection by pressing down their thumbs; but if he had been found deficient in courage or activity, they held the thumb back, and he was instantly murdered by his adversary.
9. The Roman theatre was formed after the model of the Greeks, but never attained equal eminence. The populace always paid more regard to the dresses of the actors, and the richness of the decoration, than to ingenious structure of plot, or elegance of language. Scenic representations do not appear to have been very popular at Rome, certainly never so much as the sports of the circus. Besides comedies and tragedies, the Romans had a species of drama peculiar to their country, called the Atellane farces, which were, in general, low pieces of gross indecency and vulgar buffoonery, but sometimes contained spirited satires on the character and conduct of public men.
10. We should be greatly mistaken if we supposed that the theatres in ancient Rome at all resembled those of modern times; they were stupendous edifices, some of which could accommodate thirty thousand spectators, and an army could perform its evolutions on the stage. To remedy the defects of distance, the tragic actors wore a buskin with very thick soles, to raise them above their natural size, and covered their faces with a mask so contrived as to render the voice more clear and full.[1] Instead of the buskin, comic actors wore a sort of slipper called a sock.