A Day at the Amphitheatre - Morning and Midday Flashcards
How were games advertised
On billboards
libellus
Match programme
Hours of games
Early in the morning > dusk
Describe the general timetable
Morning: animals
Midday: executions
Afternoon: gladiator show
The morning
Began with mimic gladiatorial battle with blunter weapons
Why were beast hunts used?
A way for editors to impress spectators with exotic and dangerous beasts
Describe the beast acts
Tricks
Panthers drawing chariots, a tigress tearing a lion to pieces
Elephants bowing
Two different types of animal set against each other (bear and buffalo, elephant and rhino)
Describe the animals
elephants, lions, leopards, tigers, bulls, bears, wild boars, rhinoceroses, hippopotami, buffalo, bison, crocodiles, giraffes, ostriches, camels
venationes
Wild beast hunts
Arena looked like forest/slaughterhouse
Animals gradually released
Moral of the venationes
The empire had power of nature
Demonstrated how far the empire had reached
damnati ad bestias
Execution of convicted criminals
‘Condemned to the beasts’
Describe some of the methods of execution used
Let loose in the arena to face wild beats, daubed with blood
Tied to stakes facing lions
Dangerous tasks with the animals (using a hook to undo a chain typing a bear to a bull)
Re-enacting famous myths
Gladiatores meridiani
‘Midday gladiators’
Criminals forced to fight one another as gladiators - one was armed and one wore a tunic
