A documentary on the female gladiators of the arena! Sign up to your MyHeritage free trial and get a 50% discount if you continue your subscription: https://bit.ly/Invicta_MH

In this history documentary we seek to answer the question: Did women ever take to the sands of the arena as female gladiators?

It turns out that we do in fact have many records of this occurring from ancient writings, artistic depictions, and archaeological findings. For the most part this seems to have been a form of exotic entertainment owing to the fact that women fighting was contrary to traditional norms and was thus seen as both novel and exciting. Many show runners therefore sought to include them in their own gladiatorial games as a way to advertise such events as being more spectacular than the competition.

This first seems to have begun around the reign of Emperor Augustus as is evidenced by legislation at the time which sought to limit male and female aristocrats from performing in the games. The Roman Emperors who followed had fewer qualms with this. For instance Nero was said to be a huge fan of female gladiators and had many of them perform in his various games. Over the following centuries we see evidence of Female Gladiators popping up across the Empire. However this practice would eventually begin to decline around the reign of Septimius Severus who supposedly outlawed Gladiatrixes in the 2nd century AD. I hope you found this history documentary both entertaining and enlightening.

What "How They Did It" topics should we cover next?
You can check out the rest of our series on Roman Gladiators!
Rise of the Gladiators -    • Where did Gladiators come from? Origi...  
A Day at the Games -    • What was a day at the Roman Colosseum...  
Naval Gladiator Battles -    • Naval Gladiator Battles - What Were t...  

Sources and Suggested Reading
"Emperors and Gladiators" by Thomas Wiedemann
"The Roman Games" by Alison Futrell
"The Victor's Crown" by David Stone Potter
"Annales 15.32.3" by Tacitus
"Satyricon XLV" by Petronius
"Liber De Spectaculis 6 and 6b" by Martial
"Vita Domitiani 4.1" by Suetonius
"Silvae 1.6.51-56" by Statius

Credits
Research = Chris Das Neves
Script = Chris Das Neves
Narration = Invicta
Artwork = Beverly Johnson
Editing = Penta Limited

#history
#documentary
#rome