04-30-2005, 03:42 PM
As to the character Serpeninus, he's a venator and they usually didn't wear armor (there are exceptions, though.) It's probably just a design on his tunic. That's his back you're looking at, by the way.
However, it looks as if at this date the secutors and retiarii had developed into "light" and "heavy" classes. On this mosaic, where the secutor wears the traditional helmet and what appears to be a fabric manica, his opponent wears the traditional fabric manica and galerus. Where the secutor wears something like a murmillo helmet and a scale manica, his opponent also wears the scale manica. There is what looks like a very hevy gladiator in this mosiac, though he's not pictured above. He wears a murmillo helmet and shield, and what appears to be paired greaves and some sort o breastplate, a "Ridley Scott" gladiator if you will. The overall crudity of the mosaic makes it hard to distinguish details. It seems that Roman standards for mosaic work had fallen from the 1st-2nd century.
However, it looks as if at this date the secutors and retiarii had developed into "light" and "heavy" classes. On this mosaic, where the secutor wears the traditional helmet and what appears to be a fabric manica, his opponent wears the traditional fabric manica and galerus. Where the secutor wears something like a murmillo helmet and a scale manica, his opponent also wears the scale manica. There is what looks like a very hevy gladiator in this mosiac, though he's not pictured above. He wears a murmillo helmet and shield, and what appears to be paired greaves and some sort o breastplate, a "Ridley Scott" gladiator if you will. The overall crudity of the mosaic makes it hard to distinguish details. It seems that Roman standards for mosaic work had fallen from the 1st-2nd century.
Pecunia non olet
