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Hi. I've been watching a certain testosterone-charged, sex-obsessed, CGI blood splattered and somewhat New Zealand-accented TV drama series about Spartacus :wink:
Which has me asking a niggling - remotely historical - question: who were the guards at a gladiator school? The series and I'm sure Kirk Douglas's film put legionaries as the guards - which I would disregard as unlikely if I hadn't flicked through the Osprey book illustrated by Angus McBride and seen a legionary-kitted guard in that too.
So who were the guards? Do we know anything about them? And if not actual milites how were they armed? Did Roman law make an exception in their case?
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We dont really know. There has been a Legionary type helmet found at Pompeii but that could as well have been the helmet of a Gladiator. Maybe owners of a Ludus would have their own staff to guard the Legionaries, I do not think that Vigiles were used (city guards/firemen/policing staff), nor military of some kind.
M.VIB.M.
Bushido wa watashi no shuukyou de gozaru.
Katte Kabuto no O wo shimeyo!
H.J.Vrielink.
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The guards may have been a detachment from the town garrison. Capua had lost its autonomy for its disloyalty during the 2nd Punic War. It was partly colonized by retired veterans who could have made up a garrison.
But, like Nathan, I'm clined to think the guards were privately raised by the owner(s) of the school.
~Theo
Jaime
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It sounds like a natural job for recently discharged soldiers, of whom the late Republic had an abundance, many of them waiting for their land grants. Security firms all over the world right now are full of recent vets.
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Thanks for the replies everyone. Very interesting.
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I agree with most of the above too. As a private business (certainly in Republican times, which Spartacus lived in) it does not make sense for the state to have paid for guards. The lanista of the school would have paid for men to guard the place himself.
Ben Kane, bestselling author of the Eagles of Rome, Spartacus and Hannibal novels.
Eagles in the Storm released in UK on March 23, 2017.
Aguilas en la tormenta saldra en 2017.
www.benkane.net
Twitter: @benkaneauthor
Facebook: facebook.com/benkanebooks
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Quote: They would have owed a debt of service to their former owner anyway,
Can you expand on this please?
thanks
Conal Moran
Do or do not, there is no try!
Yoda