Gladiators in Ancient Rome
Posted by MRL on Feb 26th 2024
People of all walks of life were either driven or pulled to become a gladiator in Ancient Rome. Some were taken captive on the battlefield and sold into slavery; others willingly gave up their freedom in repayment of debts, crimes or simply to seek fame and fortune. Even emperors competed in gladiatorial games. Wherever you can from before, the life of a gladiator was harsh (emperors competed in the games occasionally but where never t...
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The Differences between the Maintz and Pompeii styles of Gladius
Posted by MRL on Jan 10th 2018
The Roman Gladius was effectively used for centuries and during that time saw few changes in design, but the ones it did see were significant. The Maintz pattern being an evolution of the spatha and the Pompeii evolving further from the Maintz pattern. The most easily identified differences are the body style of the blade and the point of the sword.Right from the beginning a person can see that the body of these two styles vary from each other. T...
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Weapons of the Romans
Posted by MRL on Dec 31st 2006
As for their sidearm, the Roman soldier was never far from his trusty short sword, the gladius (500360). The gladius was normally worn on a baldric (200368) and slung over the shoulder to hang across the body on the opposite hip. History shows us most were worn on the right hip for a pull draw as opposed to a cross draw as this type of draw was impeded by the scutum. There were several patterns of gladius and it was not unusual for mixed types to...
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