RAT Conference November 17th-19th 2006

[caiusbeerquitius]

[Praefectusclassis]

Thanks Christian! It was indeed a most excellent event!

[Medusa Gladiatrix]

Salve Christian,

Thanks for this excellent event and perfect organization and for these wonderful pics you posted here. As you can see, I thought this pic with the helmet on is just funny so I use it as an avatar now. :lol:

And also thanks that you spent on Sunday some time with me and Volker although you were in the process of moving from one appartment to the other. And also loads of thanks for your wonderfull suggestions re my gladiatorial garb. I'm still working on sorting out suppliers of these weird materials I need for a manica and for the Samnite belts but it'll work.

[Medusa Gladiatrix]

Since Christian asked everybody to do a summary of his/her lecture I'll start with that although my lecture was the second on Saturday morning.

I was giving a short introduction to gladiators, starting with the origin of the gladiatorial games which are not clear if they are of Etruscan origin or if the originate in Campania where later on the most renowned gladiator schools (ludi) were located. The first recorded gladiatorial bouts in Rome were hold in the year 264 BC at the funeral of a patrician but it can be assumed that a tradition like this did not come out of nowhere, so that there might have been gladiator fights before in Rome but were simply not recorded.

Then I had a look at some Imperial gladiator types describing their armatura by showing this foil on the overhead projector (sorry, due to this being a pdf-file it can be only downloaded :oops: )

Then I talked about how gladiators were seen by Roman Society. They were admired in the arena very much and they represented the Roman moral quality virtus. Therefore a gladiator fight counted more than a theatrical display because that was for pure entertainment only. But outside the arena gladiators were seen as disgraced people (infamia). Nonetheless many citizens still felt attracted for the various reasons to fight as a gladiator in the arena as a volunteer (auctoratus) although due to the infamia they gave up rights such as running for office, being called for military service and were deleted from the property owning lists.

This is just a very brief summary because I would like to present this in detail in the Ancient Warfare Mag if Jasper sees it fits.

[hansvl]

Hi all,

Rather late I know, but here are some more pics from RATconference Augsburg. I was just to lazy (untill now) to download the pictures from my digital camera onto my computer.







Greets,

Hans

[Robert Vermaat]

I hope next time we get a bigger room!

[Crispvs]

Very nice photos!

Just one thing... Those of us who weren't there don't have the benefit of knowing who is who in the pictures. After all, we hardly see each other face to face most of the time and often the only pictures some of us see of each other are somewhat obscurred by our helmets.

In the photos on this thread I can recognise (I presume) Jasper, Uwe and Hansvl and I may be correct in thinking that is Christian sitting at the back of the room. Does anyone else wish to lay claim to their own face or unmask (or should that be mask?) someone else?

Crispvs

[Praefectusclassis]

From left to right:
Carlton Bach (Volker); Medusa (Svenja); CaiusTarquitius (Christian); Axel (not on RAT iirc); Martin Moser (almost hidden, but visible in another photo above); Marco (not on RAT); Jvrjenivs (Jurjen); Jona Lendering and moi