Chapter IX: Amusements; Baths (1)

REFERENCES: Marquardt, 269-296, 834-861; Staatsverwaltung, III, 504-565; Göll, III, 455-480, 104-157; Guhl and Koner, 643-658, 804-829, 609-618; Friedländer, II, 295-637; Ramsay, 394-409; Pauly-Wissowa, _amphitheātrum_, _calx_, _circus_, _Bader_; Smith, Harper, Rich, _amphitheātrum_, _balneae_, _circus_, _gladiātōrēs_, _theātrum_, and other Latin words in text; Baumeister, 694, 241-244, 2089-2111; Lübker, 1073 f., 1199 f., 477 f., 1048 f., 185, 1213; Kelsey-Mau, 135-161, 180-220.

§316. After the games of childhood (§§102, 103) were passed the Roman seemed to lose all instinct for play. Of sport for sport's sake he knew nothing, he took part in no games for the sake of excelling in them. He played ball before his dinner for the good of the exercise, he practiced riding, fencing, wrestling, hurling the discus (Fig. 128), and swimming for the strength and skill they gave him in arms, he played a few games of chance for the excitement the stakes afforded, but there was no "national game" for the young men, and there were no social amusements in which men and women took part together. The Roman made it hard and expensive, too, for others to amuse him. He cared nothing for the drama, little for spectacular shows, more for farces and variety performances, perhaps, but the one thing that really appealed to him was excitement, and this he found in gambling or in such amusements only as involved the risk of injury to life and limb, the sports of the circus and the amphitheater. We may describe first the games in which the Roman participated himself and then those at which he was a mere spectator. In the first class are field sports and games of hazard, in the second the public and private games (_lūdī pūblicī et prīvātī_).

§317. Sports of the Campus.--The Campus Martius included all the level ground lying between the Tiber and the Capitoline and Quirinal hills. The northwestern portion of this plain, bounded on two sides by the Tiber, which here sweeps abruptly to the west, kept clear of public and private buildings and often called simply the _Campus_, was for centuries the playground of Rome. Here the young men gathered to practice the athletic games mentioned above, naturally in the cooler parts of the day. Even men of graver years did not disdain a visit to the Campus after the _merīdiātiō_ (§302), in preparation for the bath before dinner, instead of which the younger men preferred to take a cool plunge in the convenient river. The sports themselves were those that we are accustomed to group together as track and field athletics. They ran foot races, jumped, threw the discus (Fig. 128), practiced archery, and had wrestling and boxing matches. These sports were carried on then much as they are now, if we may judge by Vergil's description in the Fifth Aeneid, but an exception must be made of the games of ball. These seem to have been very dull and stupid as compared with ours. It must be remembered, however, that they were played more for the healthful exercise they furnished than for the joy of the playing, and by men of high position, too--Caesar, Maecenas, and even the Emperor Augustus.

§318. Games of Ball.--Balls of different sizes are known to have been used in the different games, variously filled with hair, feathers, and air (_follēs_, Fig. 129). Throwing and catching formed the basis of all the games, the bat being practically unknown. In the simplest game the player threw the ball as high as he could, and tried to catch it before it struck the ground. Variations of this were what we should call juggling, the player keeping two or more balls in the air (Fig. 130), and throwing and catching by turns with another player. Another game must have resembled our handball, requiring a wall and smooth ground at its foot. The ball was struck with the open hand against the wall, allowed to fall back upon the ground and bound, and then struck back against the wall in the same manner. The aim of the player was to keep the ball going in this way longer than his opponent could. Private houses and the public baths often had "courts" especially prepared for this amusement. A third game was called _trigōn_, and was played by three persons, stationed at the angles of an equilateral triangle. Two balls were used and the aim of the player was to throw the ball in his possession at the one of his opponents who would be the less likely to catch it. As two might throw at the third at the same moment, or as the thrower of one ball might have to receive the second ball at the very moment of throwing, both hands had to be used and a good degree of skill was necessary. Other games, all of throwing and catching, are mentioned here and there, but none is described with sufficient detail to be clearly understood.

§319. Games of Chance.--The Romans were passionately fond of games of chance, and gambling was so universally associated with such games that they were forbidden by law, even when no stakes were actually played for. A general indulgence seems to have been granted at the Saturnalia in December, and public opinion allowed old men to play at any time. The laws were hard to enforce, however, as such laws usually are, and large sums were won and lost not merely at general gambling resorts, but also at private houses. Games of chance, in fact, with high stakes, were one of the greatest attractions at the men's dinners that have been mentioned (§314). The commonest form of gambling was our "heads or tails," coins being used as with us, the value depending on the means of the players. Another common form was our "odd or even," each player guessing in turn and in turn holding counters concealed in his outstretched hand for his opponent to guess. The stake was usually the contents of the hand though side bets were not unusual. In a variation of this game the players tried to guess the actual number of the counters held in the hand. Of more interest, however, were the games of knuckle-bones and dice.

§320. Knuckle-bones.--Knuckle-bones (_tālī_) of sheep and goats, and imitations of them in ivory, bronze, and stone, were used as playthings by children and for gaming by men. Children played our "jackstones" with them, throwing five into the air at once and catching as many as possible on the back of the hand (Fig. 131). The length of the _tālī_ was greater than their width and they had, therefore, four long sides and two ends. The ends were rounded off or pointed, so that the _tālī_ could not stand on them. Of the four long sides two were broader than the others. Of the two broader sides one was concave, the other convex; while of the narrower sides one was flat and the other indented. As all the sides were of different shapes the _tālī_ did not require marking as do our dice, but for convenience they were sometimes marked with the numbers 1, 3, 4, and 6, the numbers 2 and 5 being omitted. Four _tālī_ were used at a time, either thrown into the air with the hand or thrown from a dice-box (_fritillus_), and the side on which the bone rested was counted, not that which came up. Thirty-five different throws were possible, of which each had a different name. Four aces were the lowest throw, called the Vulture, while the highest, called the Venus, was when all the _tālī_ came up differently. It was this throw that designated the _magister bibendī_ (§313).

§321. Dice.--The Romans had also dice (_tesserae_) precisely like our own. They were made of ivory, stone, or some close-grained wood, and had the sides numbered from one to six. Three were used at a time, thrown from the _fritillus_, as were the knuckle-bones (Fig. 132), but the sides counted that came up. The highest throw was three sixes, the lowest three aces. In ordinary gaming the aim of the player seems to have been to throw a higher number than his opponent, but there were also games played with dice on boards with counters, that must have been something like our backgammon, uniting skill with chance. Little more of these is known than their names, but a board used for some such game is shown in §336 (Fig. 144). If one considers how much space is given in our newspapers to the game of baseball, and how impossible it would be for a person who had never seen a game to get a correct idea of one from the newspaper descriptions only, it will not seem strange that we know so little of Roman games.

§322. Public and Private Games.--With the historical development of the Public Games this book has no concern (§2). It is sufficient to say that these free exhibitions, given first in honor of some god or gods at the cost of the state and extended and multiplied for political purposes until all religious significance was lost, had come by the end of the Republic to be the chief pleasure in life for the lower classes in Rome, so that Juvenal declares that the free bread (§286) and the games of the circus were the people's sole desire. Not only were these games free, but when they were given all public business was stopped and all citizens were forced to take a holiday. These holidays became rapidly more and more numerous; by the end of the Republic sixty-six days were taken up by the games, and in the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161-180) no less than one hundred and thirty-five days out of the year were thus closed to business.[1] Besides these standing games, others were often given for extraordinary events, and funeral games were common when great men died. These last were not made legal holidays. For our purposes the distinction between public and private games is not important, and all may be classified according to the nature of the exhibitions as, _lūdī scēnicī_, dramatic entertainments given in a theater, _lūdī circēnsēs_, chariot races and other exhibitions given in a circus, and _mūnera gladiātōria_, shows of gladiators usually given in an amphitheater.

[Footnote 1: There are sixty holidays annually in Indiana, for example, and this is about the average for the United States.]

§323. Dramatic Performances.--The history of the development of the drama at Rome belongs, of course, to the history of Latin literature. In classical times dramatic performances consisted of comedies (_cōmoediae_), tragedies (_tragoediae_), farces (_mīmī_), and pantomimes (_pantomīmī_). The farces and pantomimes were used chiefly as interludes and afterpieces, though with the common people they were the most popular of all and outlived the others. Tragedy never had any real hold at Rome, and only the liveliest comedies gained favor on the stage. Of the comedies the only ones that have come down to us are those of Plautus and Terence, all adaptations from Greek originals, all depicting Greek life, and represented in Greek costumes (_fābulae palliātae_). They were a good deal more like our comic operas than our comedies, large parts being recited to the accompaniment of music and other parts sung while the actor danced. They were always presented in the daytime, as Roman theaters were provided with no means of lighting, in the early period after the noon meal (§301), but by Cicero's time they had come to be given in the morning. The average comedy must have required about two hours for the acting, with allowance for the occasional music between the scenes. We read of a play being acted twice in a day, but this must have been very exceptional, as time had to be allowed for the other more popular shows given on the same occasion.

§324. Staging the Play.--The play, as well as the other sports, was under the supervision of the officials in charge of the games at which it was given. They contracted for the production of the play with some recognized manager (_dominus gregis_), who was usually an actor of acknowledged ability and had associated with him a troupe (_grex_) of others only inferior to himself. The actors were all slaves (§143), and men took the parts of women. There was no limit fixed to the number of actors, but motives of economy would lead the _dominus_ to produce each play with the smallest number possible, and two or even more parts were often assigned to one actor. The characters in the comedies wore the ordinary Greek dress of daily life and the costumes (Fig. 133) were, therefore, not expensive. The only make-up required was paint for the face, especially for the actors who took women's parts, and the wigs that were used conventionally to represent different characters, gray for old men, black for young men, red for slaves, etc. These and the few properties (_ōrnāmenta_) necessary were furnished by the _dominus_. It seems to have been customary also for him to feast the actors at his expense if their efforts to entertain were unusually successful.

§325. The Early Theater.--The theater itself deserved no such name until very late in the Republic. During the period when the best plays were being written (200-160 B.C.) almost nothing was done for the accommodation of the actors or the audience. The stage was merely a temporary platform, rather wide than deep, built at the foot of a hill or a grass-covered slope. There were almost none of the things that we are accustomed to associate with a stage, no curtains, no flies, no scenery that could be changed, not even a sounding-board to aid the actor's voice. There was no way either to represent the interior of a house, and the dramatist was limited, therefore, to such situations as might be supposed to take place upon a public street. This street the stage represented; at the back of it were shown the fronts of two or three houses with windows and doors that could be opened, and sometimes there was an alley or passageway between two of the houses. An altar stood on the stage, we are told, to remind the people of the religious origin of the games. No better provision was made for the audience than for the actors. The people took their places on the slope before the stage, some reclining on the grass, some standing, some perhaps sitting on stools they had brought from home. There was always din and confusion to try the actor's voice, pushing and crowding, disputing and quarreling, wailing of children, and in the very midst of the play the report of something livelier to be seen elsewhere might draw the whole audience away.

§326. The Later Theater.--Beginning about 145 B.C., however, efforts were made to improve upon this poor apology for a theater, in spite of the opposition of those who considered the plays ruinous to morals. In that year a wooden theater on Greek lines provided with seats was erected, but the senate caused it to be pulled down as soon as the games were over. It became a fixed custom, however, for such a temporary theater with special and separate seats for senators, and much later for the knights, to be erected as often as plays were given at public games, until in 55 B.C. Pompeius Magnus erected the first permanent theater at Rome. It was built of stone after the plans of one he had seen at Mytilene and seated at least seventeen thousand people; Pliny says forty thousand. This theater showed two noteworthy divergences from its Greek model. The Greek theaters were excavated out of the side of the hill, while the Roman theater was erected on level ground (that of Pompeius in the Campus Martius) and gave, therefore, a better opportunity for exterior magnificence. The Greek theater had a large circular space for choral performances immediately before the stage; in the Roman theater this space, called the orchestra then as now, was much smaller, and was assigned to the senators. The first fourteen rows of seats rising immediately behind them were reserved for the knights. The seats back of these were occupied indiscriminately by the people, on the principle apparently of first come first served. No other permanent theaters were erected at Rome until 13 B.C., when two were constructed. The smaller had room for eleven thousand spectators, the larger, erected in honor of Marcellus, the nephew of Augustus, for twenty thousand. These improved playhouses made possible spectacular elements in the performances that the rude scaffolding of early days had not permitted, and these spectacles proved the ruin of the legitimate drama. To make realistic the scenes representing the pillaging of a city, Pompeius is said to have furnished troops of cavalry and bodies of infantry, hundreds of mules laden with real spoils of war, and three thousand mixing bowls (§314). In comparison with these three thousand mixing bowls, the avalanches, runaway locomotives, sawmills in full operation, and cathedral scenes of modern times seem poor indeed.

§327. The general appearance of these theaters, the type of hundreds erected later throughout the Roman world, may be gathered from Fig. 137, the plan of a theater on lines laid down by Vitruvius (§187). GH is the front line of the stage (_proscaenium_); all behind it is the _scaena_, devoted to the actors, all before it is the _cavea_, devoted to the spectators. IKL in the rear mark the position of three doors, for example, those of the three houses mentioned above (§325). The semicircular orchestra CMD is the part appropriated to the senators. The seats behind the orchestra, rising in concentric semicircles, are divided by five passageways into six portions (_cuneī_), and in a similar way the seats above the semicircular passage (_praecīnctiō_) shown in the figure are divided by eleven passageways into twelve _cuneī_. Access to the seats of the senators was afforded by passageways under the higher seats at the right and the left of the stage, one of which may be seen in Fig. 135, which represents a part of the smaller of the two theaters uncovered at Pompeii, built not far from 80 B.C. Over the vaulted passage will be noticed what must have been the best seats in the theater, corresponding in some degree to the boxes of modern times. These were reserved for the emperor, if he was present, for the officials who superintended the games and (on the other side) for the Vestals. Access to the higher seats was conveniently given by broad stairways constructed under the seats and running up to the passageways between the _cuneī_. These are shown in Fig. 136, a theoretical restoration of the Marcellus theater mentioned above. Behind the highest seats were broad colonnades, affording shelter in case of rain, and above them were tall masts from which awnings (_vēla_) were spread to protect the people from the sun. The appearance of the stage end may be gathered from Fig. 134, showing the remains of a Roman theater still existing at Orange,[2] in the south of France. It should be noticed that the stage was connected with the auditorium by the seats over the vaulted passages to the orchestra, and that the curtain was raised from the bottom, to hide the stage, not lowered from the top as ours is now. Vitruvius suggested that rooms and porticos be built behind the stage, like the colonnades that have been mentioned, to afford space for the actors and properties and shelter for the people in case of rain.

[Footnote 2: This theater has been restored and used for reproductions of the Classical Drama. See the interesting account of it in the "Century Magazine" for June, 1895. It is supposed to have been erected in the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161-180) and allowed to fall into ruins in the fourth century A.D.]

§328. Roman Circuses.--The games of the circus were the oldest of the free exhibitions at Rome and always the most popular. The word _circus_ means simply a ring and the _lūdī circēnsēs_ were therefore any shows that might be given in a ring. We shall see below (§343) that these shows were of several kinds, but the one most characteristic, the one that is always meant when no other is specifically named, is that of chariot races. For these races the first and really the only necessary condition is a large and level piece of ground. This was furnished by the valley between the Aventine and Palatine hills, and here in prehistoric times the first Roman race course was established. This remained _the_ circus, the one always meant when no descriptive term was added, though when others were built it was called sometimes by way of distinction the Circus Maximus. None of the others ever approached it in size, in magnificence, or in popularity.

§329. The second circus to be built at Rome was the _circus Flāminius_, founded in 221 B.C. by the same Caius Flaminius, who built the Flaminian road. It was located in the southern part of the Campus Martius (§317), and like the Circus Maximus was exposed to the frequent overflows of the Tiber. Its position is fixed beyond question, but the actual remains are very scanty, so that little is known of its size or appearance. The third to be established was that of Caius (Caligula) and Nero, named from the two emperors who had to do with its construction, and erected, therefore, in the first century A.D. It lay at the foot of the Vatican hill, but we know little more of it than that it was the smallest of the three. These three were the only circuses within the city. In the immediate neighborhood, however, were three others. Five miles out on the _via Portuēnsis_ was the circus of the Arval Brethren. About three miles out on the Appian way was the Circus of Maxentius, erected in 309 A.D. This is the best preserved of all, and a plan of it is shown in the next paragraph. On the same road, some twelve miles from the city, in the old town of Bovillae, was a third, making six within easy reach of the people of Rome.

§330. Plan of the Circus.--All of the Roman circuses known to us had the same general arrangement, which will be readily understood from the plan of the Circus of Maxentius shown in Fig. 139. The long and comparatively narrow stretch of ground which formed the race course proper (_arēna_) is almost surrounded by the tiers of seats, running in two long parallel lines uniting in a semicircle at one end. In the middle of this semicircle is a gate, marked _F_ in the plan, by which the victor left the circus when the race was over. It was called, therefore, the _porta triumphālis_. Opposite this gate at the other end of the arena was the station for the chariots (_AA_ in the plan), called _carcerēs_, "barriers," flanked by two towers at the corners (_II_), and divided into two equal sections by another gate (_B_), called the _porta pompae_, by which processions entered the circus. There are also gates (_HH_) between the towers and the seats. The exterior appearance of the towers and barriers, called together the _oppidum_, is shown in Fig. 140.

§331. The arena is divided for about two-thirds its length by a fence or wall (_MM_), called the _spīna_, "backbone." At the end of this were fixed pillars (_LL_), called _mētae_, marking the inner line of the course. Once around the _spīna_ was a lap (_spatium_, _curriculum_), and the fixed number of laps, usually seven to a race, was called a _missus_. The last lap, however, had but one turn, that at the _mēta prīma_, the one nearest the _porta triumphālis_, the finish being a straightaway dash to the _calx_. This was a chalk line drawn on the arena far enough away from the second _mēta_ to keep it from being obliterated by the hoofs of the horses as they made the turn, and far enough also from the _carcerēs_ to enable the driver to stop his team before dashing into them. The dotted line (_DN_) is the supposed location of the _calx_. It will be noticed that the important things about the developed circus are the _arēna_, _carcerēs_, _spīna_, _mētae_, and the seats, all of which will be more particularly described.

§332. The Arena.--The arena is the level space surrounded by the seats and the barriers. The name was derived from the sand used to cover its surface to spare as much as possible the unshod feet of the horses. A glance at the plan will show that speed could not have been the important thing with the Romans that it is with us. The sand, the shortness of the stretches, and the sharp turns between them were all against great speed. The Roman found his excitement in the danger of the race. In every representation of the race course that has come down to us may be seen broken chariots, fallen horses, and drivers under wheels and hoofs. The distance was not a matter of close measurement either, but varied in the several circuses, the Circus Maximus being fully 300 feet longer than the Circus of Maxentius. All seem to have had constant, however, the number of laps, seven to the race, and this also goes to prove that the danger was the chief element in the popularity of the contests. The distance actually traversed in the Circus of Maxentius may be very closely estimated. The length of the _spīna_ is about 950 feet. If we allow fifty feet for the turn at each _mēta_, each lap makes a distance of 2,000 feet, and six laps, 12,000 feet. The seventh lap had but one turn in it, but the final stretch to the _calx_ made it perhaps 300 feet longer than one of the others, say 2,300 feet. This gives a total of 14,300 feet for the whole _missus_, or about 2.7 miles. Jordan calculates the _missus_ of the Circus Maximus at 8.4 kilometers, which would be about 5.2 miles, but he seems to have taken the whole length of the arena into account, instead of that merely of the _spīna_.

§333. The Barriers.--The _carcerēs_ were the stations of the chariots and teams when ready for the races to begin. They were a series of vaulted chambers entirely separated from each other by solid walls, and closed behind by doors through which the chariots entered. The front of the chamber was formed by double doors, with the upper part made of grated bars, admitting the only light which it received. From this arrangement the name _carcer_ was derived. Each chamber was large enough to hold a chariot with its team, and as a team was composed sometimes of as many as seven horses the "prison" must have been nearly square. There was always a separate chamber for each chariot. Up to the time of Domitian the highest number of chariots was eight, but after his time as many as twelve sometimes entered the same race, and twelve _carcerēs_ had, therefore, to be provided, although four chariots was the usual number. Half of these chambers lay to the right, half to the left of the _porta pompae_. The appearance of a section of the _carcerēs_ is shown in Fig. 141.

§334. It will be noticed from the plan (§330) that the _carcerēs_ were arranged in a curved line. This is supposed to have been drawn in such a way that every chariot, no matter which of the _carcerēs_ it happened to occupy, would have the same distance to travel in order to reach the beginning of the course proper at the nearer end of the _spīna_. There was no advantage in position, therefore, at the start, and places were assigned by lot. In later times a starting line (_līnea alba_) was drawn with chalk between the second _mēta_ and the seats to the right, but the line of _carcerēs_ remained curved as of old. At the ends of the row of chambers, towers were built which seem to have been the stands for the musicians; over the _porta pompae_ was the box of the chief official of the games (_dator lūdōrum_), and between his box and the towers were seats for his friends and persons connected with the games. In Fig. 142 is shown a victor pausing before the box of the _dator_ to receive a prize before riding in triumph around the arena.

§335. The Spina and Metae.--The _spīna_ divided the race course into two parts, making a minimum distance to be run. Its length was about two-thirds that of the arena, but it started only the width of the track from the _porta triumphālis_, leaving entirely free a much larger space at the end near the _porta pompae_. It was perfectly straight, but did not run precisely parallel to the rows of seats; at the end B in the exaggerated diagram (Fig. 143) the distance BC is somewhat greater than the distance AB, in order to allow more room at the starting line (_līnea alba_, §334), where the chariots would be side by side, than further along the course, where they would be strung out. The _mētae_, so named from their shape (§284), were pillars erected at the two ends of the _spīna_ and architecturally a part of it, though there may have been a space between. In Republican times the _spīna_ and the _mētae_ must have been made of wood and movable, in order to give free space for the shows of wild beasts and the exhibitions of cavalry that were originally given in the circus. After the amphitheater was devised the circus came to be used for races exclusively and the _spīna_ became permanent. It was built up, of most massive proportions, on foundations of indestructible concrete (§210 f.) and was adorned with magnificent works of art that must have entirely concealed horses and chariots when they passed to the other side of the arena.

§336. A representation of a circus has been preserved to us in a board-game of some sort found at Bovillae (§329), which gives an excellent idea of the _spīna_, (Fig. 144). We know from various reliefs and mosaics that the _spīna_ of the Circus Maximus was covered with a series of statues and ornamental structures, such as obelisks, small temples or shrines, columns surmounted by statues, altars, trophies, and fountains. Augustus was the first to erect an obelisk in the Circus Maximus; it was restored in 1589 A.D., and now stands in the Piazza del Popolo, measuring without the base about 78 feet in height. Constantius erected another (Fig. 145) in the same circus, which now stands before the Lateran church, measuring 105 feet. The obelisk of the Circus of Maxentius now stands in the Piazza Navona. Besides these purely ornamental features, every circus had at each end of its _spīna_ a pedestal supporting seven large eggs (_ōva_) of marble, one of which was taken down at the end of each lap, in order that the people might know just how many remained to be run. Another and very different idea for the _spīna_ is shown in Fig. 146 from a mosaic at Lyons. This is a canal filled with water, with an obelisk in the middle. The _mētae_ in their developed form are shown very clearly in this mosaic, three conical pillars of stone set on a semicircular plinth, all of the most massive construction.

§337. The Seats.--The seats around the arena in the Circus Maximus were originally of wood, but accidents owing to decay and losses by fire had led by the time of the Empire to reconstruction in marble except perhaps in the very highest rows. The seats in the other circuses seem to have been from the first of stone. At the foot of the tiers of seats was a marble platform (_podium_) which ran along both sides and the curved end, coextensive therefore with them. On this _podium_ were erected boxes for the use of the more important magistrates and officials of Rome, and here Augustus placed the seats of the senators and others of high rank. He also assigned seats throughout the whole _cavea_ to various classes and organizations, separating the women from the men, though up to his time they had sat together. Between the _podium_ and the track was a screen of open work, and when Caesar showed wild beasts in the circus he had a canal ten feet wide and ten feet deep dug next the _podium_ and filled with water as an additional protection. Access to the seats was given from the rear, numerous broad stairways running up to the _praecīnctiōnēs_ (§327), of which there were probably three in the Circus Maximus. The horizontal spaces between the _praecīnctiōnēs_ were called _maeniāna_, and each of these was in turn divided by stairways into _cuneī_ (§327), and the rows of seats in the _cuneī_ were called _gradūs_. The sittings in the row do not seem to have been marked off any more than they are now in the "bleachers" at our baseball grounds. When sittings were reserved for a number of persons they were described as so many feet in such a row (_gradus_) of such a section (_cuneus_) of such a circle (_maeniānum_).

§338. The number of sittings testifies to the popularity of the races. The little circus at Bovillae had seats for at least 8,000 people, according to Hülsen, that of Maxentius for about 23,000, while the Circus Maximus, accommodating 60,000 in the time of Augustus, was enlarged to a capacity of nearly 200,000 in the time of Constantius. The seats themselves were supported upon arches of massive masonry; an idea of their appearance from the outside may be had from the exterior view of the Coliseum in §356. Every third of these vaulted chambers under the seats seems to have been used for a staircase, the others for shops and booths and in the upper parts for rooms for the employés of the circus, who must have been very numerous. Galleries seem to have crowned the seats, as in the theaters (§327), and balconies for the emperors were built in conspicuous places, the ruins not enabling their positions to be fixed precisely. An idea of the appearance of the seats from within the arena may be had from an attempted reconstruction of the Circus Maximus (Fig. 147), the details of which are quite uncertain.

§339. Furnishing the Races.--There must have been a time, of course, when the races in the circus were open to all who wished to show their horses or their skill in driving them, but by the end of the Republic no persons of repute took part in the games, and the teams and drivers were furnished by racing syndicates (_factiōnēs_), who practically controlled the market so far as concerned trained horses and trained men. With these syndicates the giver of the games contracted for the number of races that he wanted (ten or twelve a day in Caesar's time, later twice the number, and even more on special occasions), and they furnished everything needed. These syndicates were named from the colors worn by their drivers. We hear at first of two only, the red (_russāta_) and the white (_albāta_); two more were added, the blue (_veneta_) in the time of Augustus probably, and the green (_prasina_) soon after, and finally Domitian added the purple and the gold. The greatest rivalry existed between these organizations. They spent immense sums of money on their horses, importing them from Greece, Spain, and Mauritania, and even larger sums, perhaps, upon the drivers. They maintained training stables on as large a scale as any of which modern times can boast; a mosaic found in one of these establishments in Algeria names among the attendants jockeys, grooms, stable-boys, saddlers, doctors, trainers, coaches, and messengers, and shows the horses covered with blankets in their stalls. This rivalry spread throughout the city; each _factiō_ had its partisans, and vast sums of money were lost and won as each _missus_ was finished. All the tricks of the ring were skillfully practiced; horses were hocused, drivers hired from rival syndicates or bribed, and even poisoned, we are told, when they were proof against money.

§340. The Teams.--The chariot used in the races was low and light, closed in front, open behind, with long axles and low wheels to lessen the risk of turning over. The driver seems to have stood well forward in the car, there being no standing place behind the axle, as shown in the cut (Fig. 148). The teams consisted of two horses (_bīgae_), three (_trīgae_), four (_quadrīgae_), and in later times six (_sēiugēs_) or even seven (_septeiugēs_), but the four-horse team was the most common and may be taken as the type. Two of the horses were yoked together, one on each side of the tongue, the others were attached to the car merely by traces. Of the four the horse to the extreme left was the most important, because the _mēta_ lay always on the left and the highest skill of the driver was shown in turning it as closely as possible. The failure of the horse nearest it to respond promptly to the rein or the word might mean the wreck of the car (by going too close) or the loss of the inside track (by going too wide), and in either case the loss of the race. Inscriptions sometimes give the names of all the horses of the team, sometimes only the horse on the left is mentioned. Before the races began lists of the horses and drivers in each were published for the guidance of those who wished to stake their money, and while no time was kept the records of horses and men were followed as eagerly as now. From the nature of the course (§332) it is evident that strength and courage and above all lasting qualities were as essential as speed. The horses were almost always stallions (mares are very rarely mentioned), and were never raced under five years of age. Considering the length of the course and the great risk of accidents it is surprising how long the horses lasted. It was not unusual for a horse to win a hundred races (such a horse was called _centēnārius_), and one Diocles, himself a famous driver, owned a horse that had won two hundred (_ducēnārius_).

§341. The Drivers.--The drivers (_agitātōrēs_, _aurīgae_) were slaves or freedmen, some of whom had won their freedom by their skill and daring in the course. Only in the most corrupt days of the Empire did citizens of any social position take actual part in the races. The dress of the driver is shown in Fig. 149; especially to be noticed are the close fitting cap, the short tunic (always of the color of his _factiō_), laced around the body with leathern thongs, the straps of leather around the thighs, the shoulder pads, and the heavy leather protectors for the legs. Our football players wear like defensive armor. The reins were knotted together and passed around the driver's body. In his belt he carried a knife to cut the reins in case he should be thrown from the car, or to cut the traces if a horse should fall and become entangled in them. The races gave as many opportunities then as now for skillful driving, and required even more of strength and daring. What we should call "fouling" was encouraged. The driver might turn his team against another, might upset the car of a rival if he could; having gained the inside track he might drive out of the straight course to keep a swifter team from passing his. The rewards were proportionately great. The successful _aurīga_, despised though his station, was the pet and pride of the race-mad crowd, and under the Empire at least he was courted and fêted by high and low. The pay of successful drivers was extravagant, the rival syndicates bidding against each other for the services of the most popular. Rich presents, too, were given them when they won their races, not only by their _factiōnēs_, but also by outsiders who had backed them and profited by their skill.

§342. Famous Aurigae.--The names of some of these victors have come down to us in inscriptions (§10) erected in their honor or to their memory by their friends. Among these may be mentioned Publius Aelius Gutta Calpurnianus (§58) of the late Empire (1,127 victories), Caius Apuleius Diocles, a Spaniard (in twenty-four years 4,257 races, l,462 victories, winning the sum of 35,863,120 sesterces, about $1,800,000), Flavius Scorpus (2,048 victories at the age of twenty-seven), Marcus Aurelius Liber (3,000 victories), Pompeius Muscosus (3,559 victories). To these may be added Crescens, an inscription[3] in honor of whom was found at Rome in 1878 and is shown in Fig. 150.

[Footnote 3: "Crescens, a driver of the blue syndicate, of the Moorish nation, twenty-two years of age. He won his first victory as a driver of a four-horse chariot in the consulship of Lucius Vipstanius Messalla on the birthday of the deified Nerva in the twenty-fourth race with these horses: Circius, Acceptor, Delicatus, and Cotynus. From Messalla's consulship to the birthday of the deified Claudius in the consulship of Glabrio he was sent from the barriers six hundred and eighty-six times and was victorious forty-seven times. In races between chariots with one from each syndicate he won nineteen times, with two from each twenty-three times, with three from each five times. He held back purposely once, took first place at the start eight times, took it from others thirty-eight times. He won second place one hundred and thirty times, third place one hundred and eleven times. His winnings amounted to 1,558,346 sesterces (about $78,000)."]

§343. Other Shows of the Circus.--The circus was used less frequently for other exhibitions than chariot races. Of these may be mentioned the performances of the _dēsultōrēs_, men who rode two horses and leaped from one to the other while going at full speed, and of trained horses who performed various tricks while standing on a sort of wheeled platform which gave a very unstable footing. There were also exhibitions of horsemanship by citizens of good standing, riding under leaders in squadrons, to show the evolutions of the cavalry. The _lūdus Trōiae_ was also performed by young men of the nobility, a game that Vergil has described in the Fifth Aeneid. More to the taste of the crowd were the hunts (_vēnātiōnēs_), when wild beasts were turned loose in the circus to slaughter each other or be slaughtered by men trained for the purpose. We read of panthers, bears, bulls, lions, elephants, hippopotami, and even crocodiles (in artificial lakes made in the arena) exhibited during the Republic. In the circus, too, combats of gladiators sometimes took place, but these were more frequently in the amphitheater. One of the most brilliant spectacles must have been the procession (_pompa circēnsis_) which formally opened some of the public games. It started from the capitol and wound its way down to the Circus Maximus, entering by the _porta pompae_ (named from it, §330), and passed entirely around the arena. At the head in a car rode the presiding magistrate, wearing the garb of a triumphant general and attended by a slave who held a wreath of gold over his head. Next came a crowd of notables on horseback and on foot, then the chariots and horsemen who were to take part in the games. Then followed priests, arranged by their colleges, and bearers of incense and of the instruments used in sacrifices, and statues of deities on low cars drawn by mules, horses, or elephants, or else carried on litters (_fercula_) on the shoulders of men. Bands of musicians headed each division of the procession, a feeble reminiscence of which is seen in the parade through the streets that precedes the performance of the modern circus.

§344. Gladiatorial Combats.--Gladiatorial combats seem to have been known in Italy long before the founding of Rome. We hear of them first in Campania and Etruria. In Campania the wealthy and dissolute nobles, we are told, made slaves fight to the death at their banquets and revels for the entertainment of their guests. In Etruria the combats go back in all probability to the offering of human sacrifices at the burial of distinguished men in accordance with the ancient belief that blood is acceptable to the dead. The victims were captives taken in war, and it became the custom gradually to give them a chance for their lives by supplying them with weapons and allowing them to fight each other at the grave, the victor being spared at least for the time. The Romans were slow to adopt the custom, the first exhibition being given in the year 264 B.C., almost five centuries after the founding of the city. That they derived it from Etruria rather than Campania is shown by the fact that the exhibitions were at funeral games, the earliest at those of Brutus Pera in 264 B.C., Marcus Aemilius Lepidus in 216 B.C., Marcus Valerius Lavinus in 200 B.C., and Publius Licinius in 183 B.C.

§345. For the first one hundred years after their introduction the exhibitions were infrequent as the dates just given show, those mentioned being all of which we have any knowledge during the period, but after this time they were given more and more frequently and always on a larger scale. During the Republic, however, they remained in theory at least private games (_mūnera_), not public games (_lūdī_); that is, they were not celebrated on fixed days recurring annually, and the givers of the exhibitions had to find a pretext for them in the death of relatives or friends, and to defray the expenses from their own pockets. In fact we know of but one instance in which actual magistrates (the consuls Publius and Manlius, 105 B.C.) gave such exhibitions, and we know too little of the attendant circumstances to warrant us in assuming that they acted in their official capacity. Even under the Empire the gladiators did not fight on the days of the regular public games. Augustus, however, provided funds for "extraordinary shows" under the direction of the praetors. Under Domitian the aediles-elect were put in charge of these exhibitions which were given regularly in December, the only instance known of fixed dates for the _mūnera gladiātōria_. All others of which we read are to be considered the freewill offerings to the people of emperors, magistrates, or private citizens.

§346. Popularity of the Combats.--The Romans' love of excitement (§316) made the exhibitions immediately and immensely popular. At the first exhibition mentioned above, that in honor of Brutus Pera, three pairs of gladiators only were shown, but in the three that followed the number of pairs rose in order to twenty-two, twenty-five, and sixty. By the time of Sulla politicians had found in the _mūnera_ the most effective means to win the favor of the people, and vied with one another in the frequency of the shows and the number of the combatants. Besides this, the same politicians made these shows a pretext for surrounding themselves with bands of bravos and bullies, all called gladiators whether destined for the arena or not, with which they started riots in the streets, broke up public meetings, overawed the courts and even directed or prevented the elections. Caesar's preparations for an exhibition when he was canvassing for the aedileship (65 B.C.) caused such general fear that the senate passed a law limiting the number of gladiators that a private citizen might employ, and he was allowed to exhibit only 320 pairs. The bands of Clodius and Milo made the city a slaughterhouse in 53 B.C., and order was not restored until late in the following year when Pompey as "sole consul" put an end to the battle of the bludgeons with the swords of his soldiers. During the Empire the number actually exhibited almost surpasses belief. Augustus gave eight _mūnera_, in which no less than ten thousand men fought, but these were distributed through the whole period of his reign. Trajan exhibited as many in four months only of the year 107 A.D., in celebration of his conquest of the Dacians. The first Gordian, emperor in 238 A.D., gave _mūnera_ monthly in the year of his aedileship, the number of pairs running from 150 to 500. These exhibitions did not cease until the fifteenth century of our era.

§347. Sources of Supply.--In the early Republic the gladiators were captives taken in war, naturally men practiced in the use of weapons (§161), who thought death by the sword a happier fate than the slavery that awaited them (§140). This always remained the chief source of supply, though it became inadequate as the demand increased. From the time of Sulla training-schools were established in which slaves with or without previous experience in war were fitted for the profession. These were naturally slaves of the most intractable and desperate character (§170). From the time of Augustus criminals were sentenced to the arena (later "to the lions"), but only non-citizens, and these for the most heinous crimes, treason, murder, arson, and the like. Finally in the late Empire the arena became the last desperate resort of the dissipated and prodigal, and these volunteers were numerous enough to be given as a class the name _auctōrātī_.

§348. As the number of the exhibitions increased it became harder and harder to supply the gladiators demanded, for it must be remembered that there were exhibitions in many of the cities of the provinces and in the smaller towns of Italy as well as at Rome. The lines were, therefore, constantly crossed, and thousands died miserably in the arena whom only the most glaring injustice could number in the classes mentioned above. In Cicero's time provincial governors were accused of sending unoffending provincials to be slaughtered in Rome and of forcing Roman citizens, obscure and friendless, of course, to fight in the provincial shows. Later it was common enough to send to the arena men sentenced for the pettiest offenses, when the supply of real criminals had run short, and to trump up charges against the innocent for the same purpose. The persecution of the Christians was largely due to the demand for more gladiators. So, too, the distinction was lost between actual prisoners of war and peaceful non-combatants; after the fall of Jerusalem all Jews over seventeen years of age were condemned by Titus to work in the mines or fight in the arena. Wars on the border were waged for the sole purpose of taking men who could be made gladiators, and in default of men, children and women were sometimes made to fight.

§349. Schools for Gladiators.--The training-schools for gladiators (_lūdī gladiātōriī_) have been mentioned already. Cicero during his consulship speaks of one at Rome, and there were others before his time at Capua and Praeneste. Some of these were set up by wealthy nobles for the purpose of preparing their own gladiators for _mūnera_ which they expected to give; others were the property of regular dealers in gladiators, who kept and trained them for hire. The business was almost as disreputable as that of the _lēnōnēs_ (§139). During the Empire training-schools were maintained at public expense and under the direction of state officials not only in Rome, where there were four at least of these schools, but also in other cities of Italy where exhibitions were frequently given, and even in the provinces. The purpose of all the schools, public and private alike, was the same, to make the men trained in them as effective fighting machines as possible. The gladiators were in charge of competent training masters (_lanistae_); they were subject to the strictest discipline; their diet was carefully looked after, a special food (_sagīna gladiātōria_) being provided for them; regular gymnastic exercises were prescribed, and lessons given in the use of the various weapons by recognized experts (_magistrī_, _doctōrēs_). In their fencing bouts wooden swords (_rudēs_) were used. The gladiators associated in a school were collectively called a _familia_.