“Unveiling the Blood and Glory: The Untold Realities of Life as a Gladiator in Ancient Rome”
In any event, the crowd seems to have done these gestures rather than the editor. But once their opinions were seen, the editor could decide several things: mercy for both gladiators, mercy for the defeated, ordering the winner to kill the defeated gladiator, complete manumission of one or both combatants, or giving the winner the choice to end his opponent’s life. Noteworthy here is that the editor footed the bill on any slain or freed gladiator, perhaps slightly incentivizing to keep them alive, especially if they were an accomplished fighter.
As for broad death rates, just like modern combat sports, the crowd could be more or less blood thirsty depending on the era and region, and their reactions to sparing a gladiator could vary. But it is known that gladiators tended to live after a fight much more so than media would make it seem. And these individuals often had fight records comparable to modern boxers or mixed martial arts fighters today.
That said, despite the extreme fame some of these individuals reached, gladiators never really enjoyed the respectability of their Greek athletic predecessors, or their modern combat sports antecedents, and gladiators were considered a lowly class in Roman society. And when we say low, we mean very low. For example, a common way to soothe a mother of a dead child was to assure her that at least he didn’t grow up to be a gladiator.
That said, that didn’t stop emperor Commodus from getting in the arena more than 700 times in essentially fixed matches. And gladiators did have their adoring fans, some of whom went out of their way to meet them, have spicey time with them, and even memorialize them if they died in the arena. Probably the most famous gladiator of all, Spartacus, even led a revolt against the Roman Republic in 73 BCE; the largest slave revolt in Rome.
