The gladiator industry was, to some degree, an equal-opportunity profession. While most gladiators were enslaved people, criminals, or prisoners of war, they might find themselves training with and fighting nobility, free people, and both men and women from all strata of society.
Sometimes, free and once-wealthy Romans signed up to become gladiators when they faced a financial cliff. For example, according to Michael Grant's "Gladiators," the Roman poet Juvenal lamented how one Sempronius, a descendant of the aristocratic Gracchus clan, had found himself in such circumstances that he resorted to a gladiatorial career. For other free people, the associated glory of armed combat before an enthusiastic and bloodthirsty crowd was the appeal. The most prominent example of upper-class thrill-seeking Romans going gladiatorial is the insane and sadistic emperor Commodus (he thought he was a reincarnation of Hercules), who actively fought in the arena, although the outcome of Commodus's matches were effectively determined in advance — with him as the victor.
For centuries, gladiator fighting was not gender exclusive, either. Until A.D. 200, when the emperor Septimius Severus outlawed the practice, women fought as gladiators. Although the vast majority of gladiators were men, female contests were a niche that had its appeal in some quarters. The emperor Domitian in particular seemed to enjoy these fights, setting up bouts by torchlight. Some of these female gladiators came from aristocratic stock (to great scandal), though it is unclear why they signed up for the bloodsport. But for these women gladiators, like the men, the spectacle was still central, and they took on mythological names like Amazon and Achillia.
[Featured image by Carole Raddato via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 2.0]
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