alt Hacker News> The most common perception of gladiatorial games is that they were violent and gruesome because someone always died,” says archaeologist R. R. R. Smith of the University of Oxford, who directs excavations at the site of Aphrodisias. “This isn’t true. In gladiatorial games, most of the time, both participants left the arena on their feet. The games weren’t about killing, but about the excitement of two men fighting, about showcasing skill, discipline, endurance, strength, tactics, and different weapons.” In the rare cases when gladiators were killed or condemned to death, they had been trained to die theatrically to add to the performance’s impact.
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To be honest when I think of Gladiators I think in terms of WWE wrestling more than I do MMA. As it is meant to be more of a spectacle.
Given all the training done with gladiators, if every match resulted in a death, it would likely be unsustainable.
Imagine if Formula 1 racing was a demolition derby.
By nature they are violent because they are fighting. I would not like these odds.
> There have been works that estimate the actual percentage of deaths; the highest I've heard is 1/5 matches resulting in a death, quite often accidentally. That was Mary Beard's estimate. Many other authors have estimate somewhere between 1/5 and 1/8 matches resulting in deaths.
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