Gladiators of the Colosseum: who they were and how they really fought

Short answer: gladiators were mostly enslaved men, prisoners of war and condemned criminals, with some free volunteers. They trained in schools, fought in matched pairs of contrasting types under referees, and were expensive to replace, so most bouts did not end in death. A day at the Colosseum ran from animal hunts in the morning, through executions at midday, to the gladiators in the afternoon. And «we who are about to die salute you» was not their salute.

Who they were

Most gladiators were enslaved, many of them prisoners of war; some were criminals sentenced to the schools. But a minority were free men who signed themselves up — for debts, for money or for fame — and accepted the legal status of a gladiator, which was among the lowest in Roman society. A successful fighter could be both despised and adored: graffiti in Pompeii call one gladiator «the girls’ heart-throb».

The schools

Fighters lived and trained in schools called ludi. The biggest in Rome, the Ludus Magnus, stood right next to the Colosseum, and part of its curved practice arena is still visible from the street. It was connected to the amphitheatre by a tunnel, so fighters could arrive without passing through the crowd.

A day of games

• Morning: the venatio, the animal hunts — exotic beasts from across the empire, and specialist hunters who fought them.
• Midday: executions of condemned criminals, often by animals or staged as scenes from myth. Many better-off spectators left for lunch.
• Afternoon: the main event, the gladiators, in pairs, one bout after another.

Fighter types

Gladiators did not fight at random. Each belonged to a type with its own armour and weapons, and organisers matched contrasting types to make the fight interesting. The classic pairing was the retiarius — almost no armour, a net, a trident and a dagger — against the secutor, with a large shield and a smooth, round helmet the net could not easily catch. Others included the murmillo with his big shield and crested helmet, and the thraex with a small shield and a curved sword.

Rules and referees

Bouts had referees — a chief and an assistant — who carried long staffs, could stop a fight, separate the fighters and give them a break. A beaten fighter could appeal for mercy by raising a finger. The decision belonged to the man paying for the games, usually guided by the crowd. Being spared, missio, was common, especially for a fighter who had fought well.

How often they died

Less often than the films suggest. A trained gladiator was a valuable investment for the school that owned him, and the sponsor of the games had to compensate the owner for a fighter killed. Historians who have studied the records estimate that most bouts, at least in the first century AD, ended without a death. The risk grew in later periods and in the most lavish games. A fighter who survived long enough could be given the rudis, a wooden sword, which meant retirement.

What they ate

Pliny the Elder calls gladiators hordearii, «barley men». An analysis of bones from a gladiators’ cemetery at Ephesus, published in 2014, supported this: they ate mostly grain and beans, little meat, and seem to have taken plant ash as a mineral supplement. The diet may also have helped build a layer of fat that protected them from shallow cuts.

Women in the arena

There were female gladiators, though they were rare and treated as a novelty. Ancient writers mention them under several emperors, and a relief from Halicarnassus, now in the British Museum, shows two women fighting. Emperor Septimius Severus banned them around 200 AD.

The salute nobody used

«Ave, Caesar, morituri te salutant» — «Hail, Caesar, those who are about to die salute you» — appears once in ancient literature. Suetonius records it being said to the emperor Claudius before a staged naval battle on the Fucine Lake, by condemned men, not gladiators, hoping to be spared. There is no evidence it was ever a routine gladiators’ greeting.

The end

Gladiator fights became rarer under the Christian emperors and disappeared in the early fifth century. Animal hunts in the Colosseum continued for about another century.

Updated 2026-10-27