Roman Entertainment

The Romans had many choices of what to do during their spare time. Such
as ball games, board games, and watching gladiators in the Colisseum.
Watching gladiators in the Colisseum was probably the favorite.
The first gladiators were part of a sacrificial rite adopted from the
Etruscans. First introduced to Rome in 264 BC, the sons of Junius Brutus
honored their father at his funeral by matching three pairs of gladiators.
Gladitorial combat was originally part of a religious ceremony that was
intended to insure that the dead would be accompanied to the "next world" by
armed attendants and that the spirits of the dead would be appeased with this
offering of blood.

This Roman mosaic shows triumphant and fallen gladiators; some victorious
gladiators became very famous and powerful. Many gladitorial battles were
fights to the death.

Gladiators were generally condemned criminals, prisoners of war or slaves
bought for this purpose. Some free men entered this profession in hopes of
popularity and patronage by wealthy citizens. The free men were often social
outcasts, freed slaves or discharged soldiers. They volunteered to be
gladiators and by the end of the Republic made up half the number of
combatants. Gladiators were trained in combat at special, imperial schools.

The gladiator games were presented for ten to twelve days each year, and
often correlated was Saturnalia (a festival celebrating the god Saturn).

The most famous amphitheater was the Colosseum, the Flavian Amphitheatre
which was built around 80 AD. It seated 50,000 people. The monumental size of
this structure and its central location in the city speaks directly to the
importance of this building and consequently this sport in the Roman Empire.

It is said to note that the popularity of these spectacles led to the death
of tens of thousands of animals. Entire species were no longer found in their
native habitat. In the afternoon you would see gladiators paired; evenly
matched, but not identical so there would be no competitive advantage. You
might see retiari who were lightly armed, but must fight against the
secutores or myrmidon's who were protected by heavy armor that reduced their
mobility. Depending on the Emperor of the day you would see dwarfs fighting
women, amazons, senators, and even emperors. Gladiators and the arenas they
occupied were dangerous and very appealing to the roman people.

Most of these gladitorial battles were fought to the death unless the life of
the losing gladiator was spared by the vote of the audience. Thumbs up meant
death for the loser, while a thumbs down granted a reprieve. Unfortunately,
for the vanquished combatants, this reprieve rarely came.

Ball-playing was popular among the Romans, and they often spent their
morning exercises playing games on the fields (palaestra) or ball-courts
(sphaerista). The Romans enjoyed a variety of ball games, including Handball
(Expulsim Ludere), Trigon, Soccer, Field Hockey, Harpasta, Phaininda,
Episkyros, and certainly Catch and other games that children might invent,
like Dodge Ball. An additional game called Roman Ball is theorized to fill
some gaps.

The Romans played a wide variety of board games, including Knucklebones
(Tali & Tropa), Dice (Tesserae), Roman Chess (Latrunculi), Roman Checkers
(Calculi), The Game of Twelve Lines (Duodecim Scripta), The Game of Lucky
Sixes (Felix Sex), Tic-Tac-Toe (Terni Lapilli), Roman Backgammon (Tabula),
Egyptian Backgammon (Senet), and others.