Rome had an uneasy relationship with its gladiators. Admired and loathed in equal measure, they often played a crucial role in keeping the mob content, and creating a wellspring of support for the Emperor. Julius Caesar set the trend by establishing his own school of gladiators and laying on great spectacles, free of charge, to the delight of the mob – who idolised him in return. Later on, emperors, high priests and dignitaries competed to hold increasingly elaborate spectacles in order to win popular support. But these same aristocrats also held a scathing view of the gladiators themselves, believing them to be degenerates on a par with slaves.

Becoming a gladiator placed a man in a permanent state of infamy, and stories of high-born sons of senators and equestrians enrolling in gladiator schools – to pay off debts or to seek out a new thrill – scandalised the establishment. How such men signed up to the schools isn’t known. Most of the surviving inscriptions on gladiator gravestones are thought to have belonged to freedmen, but they were likely to have been paid for by friends and family. The more numerous slaves, prisoners of war and criminals who populated gladiator schools would not have been so fortunate. The fact that the aristocrats who became gladiators were written about at the time suggests it was a rarer occurrence. Certainly for Pavo, the disgrace of a military tribune being thrown into a ludus would have given rise to heated gossip in bathhouses and inns throughout Rome.

Praetorian Extract

To find out what happens to Pavo next, read CHALLENGER,
the second action-packed instalment in the ARENA series,
coming in December 2012 and available to pre-order . . .

Now read on for the first chapter of PRAETORIAN, Simon
Scarrow’s eleventh gripping Cato and Macro novel, on
sale in paperback and ebook.

PRAETORIAN

CHAPTER ONE

The small convoy of covered wagons had been on the road for ten days when it crossed the frontier into the province of Cisalpine Gaul. The first snows had already fallen in the mountains to the north that towered above the route, their peaks gleaming brilliantly against the blue sky. The early winter had been kind to the men marching with the convoy and though the air was cold and crisp, there had been no rain since they had left the imperial mint in Narbonesis. A bitter frost had left the ground hard and easy going for the wheels of the heavily laden wagons.