07-21-2011, 04:42 PM
Gladiators during the Republic were a bit different than the ones under the Principate. Colleen McCullough was pulling from the more recent scholarship on Spartacus as it is now assumed by such as Barry Strauss (The Spartacus War) that he was a soldier under some sort of punishment.
The research needed would look at whether, in fact, soldiers under the later Republic could be punished for mutiny or the like by being sent to serve as gladiators for a period of time. Then, if so and if they survived, could/would they be accepted into military service again?
Simon Scarrow makes a similar "error" with Cato in his series of novels. Cato was a palace freedman. He should have been absolutely barred from anything except service in the Vigiles. However, minimally it works because the man putting him in the army and in the legions, no less, is the highest authority in the Empire, Claudius, who is the Emperor and who had freed Cato. We do know that an optio in Legio III Cyrenaica, T. Flavius Longus, had to prove he was freeborn when his status and thus his right to be in the legion was questioned. He obtained affidavits; the Romans had no such thing as birth certificates.
The research needed would look at whether, in fact, soldiers under the later Republic could be punished for mutiny or the like by being sent to serve as gladiators for a period of time. Then, if so and if they survived, could/would they be accepted into military service again?
Simon Scarrow makes a similar "error" with Cato in his series of novels. Cato was a palace freedman. He should have been absolutely barred from anything except service in the Vigiles. However, minimally it works because the man putting him in the army and in the legions, no less, is the highest authority in the Empire, Claudius, who is the Emperor and who had freed Cato. We do know that an optio in Legio III Cyrenaica, T. Flavius Longus, had to prove he was freeborn when his status and thus his right to be in the legion was questioned. He obtained affidavits; the Romans had no such thing as birth certificates.
Quinton Johansen
Marcus Quintius Clavus, Optio Secundae Pili Prioris Legionis III Cyrenaicae
Marcus Quintius Clavus, Optio Secundae Pili Prioris Legionis III Cyrenaicae
