08-06-2010, 09:20 AM
Quote:Junkelmann shows another picture in his book where a similar gesture like that one the Nimes tables is to be seen, this time it is a tubicen stretching out two fingers pointing at the defeated gladiator and pressing the thumb against the hand. It a relief fragment from Rome dating to the end of the 1st century BC and is today at the Glyptothek in Munich.
Besides turning the thumb (pollice verso) or pressing the thumb (pollice premere) there should have been two distinctive movements with the arm. At pollice verso where the thumb could represent the sword the movement could be against the chest or throat therefore indicating to kill the loser.
It was for the editor muneris to decide if the defeated gladiator should be killed or not but very often he relied on the opinion of the majority of the audience and therefore they needed to make two different easily to distinct gestures. Therefore the thumb gesture as a representation of a sword should be accompanied e.g. by either waving the arm or holding it still. But the scholars (Junkelmann and others he cites in his book) do not know for sure.
What's happened to illustration?
Conal Moran
Do or do not, there is no try!
Yoda
Do or do not, there is no try!
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