Entertainment - Usefulness Flashcards
Amphitheatre at Pompeii
Primary source
Fairly well preserved (shape & size)
Indication of typical features (seating, vomitoria, awning)
Is damaged - incomplete
Can’t view all of it
Hard to get a sense of atmosphere
Doesn’t show activities that happened there
Parts are missing
Colosseum, Rome
Primary source
Highly impressive structure (design & complexity)
Central Roman location
Recognisable features
Semi-ruined
Missing features
Amabilis Epitaph
Evidence for gladiator origins, stage names, number of fights
Gives a sense of importance to Roman society
Recruitment for a gladiator
Highly selective info
Very typical
Secondary source
Murmillo helmet
Primary source
Good evidence for costume/armour
Theatricality - liven the show
Doesn’t have the full set
Colour is faded
Isn’t comparable to other helmets
Don’t know how it would have been used
Venator Relief
Contemporary evidence
Shows real dangers he faces
Allows us to imagine the venator
Incomplete fragment
Don’t have original context & location
Cannot fully understand what if would have looked like
Eppia - Juvenal
Shows stereotypes in Roman society
Gladiators found attractive due to danger
Shows Roman society’s infatuation with gladiators
Exaggerates for comic effect
Aggressively attacking the ills of society
Large Theatre at Pompeii
Primary source
Shows size & shape of the theatre
Good sense of arrangements
Has surviving scenery/background
Semi-ruined
Lots of key features missing
Characters from Plautus
Shows individual stock characters
Secondary source
Doesn’t show how the characters were portrayed, the actual play
Very short extracts
Depiction of the Circus Maximus
Primary source
Shows how chariot racing was popular
Has visual characteristics of the Circus Maximus
Not painted
Fairly crude depiction
Could be a visual hyperbole
