Greetings ancient history fans! We hope you enjoyed last week’s blog post on the origins of gladiatorial combat and the different types of gladiators. If you didn’t read it, you can check it out by CLICKING HERE.

This week we’re venturing farther into the world of gladiators with a special guest post by archaeologist Raven Todd Da Silva.

Everyone who is familiar with popular representations of gladiators and gladiatorial combat will be familiar with the ‘turn of the thumb’ gesture, but do you know how that expression came about? Is it historically correct? Why was the thumb so important to Romans?

Well, Raven is going to demystify that for us. Take it away, Raven!

 

A Turn of the Thumb: Gladiators and the Thumbs Up

By: Raven Todd Da Silva

The notion of signaling life or death for a defeated gladiator by a thumbs up or thumbs down has been made popular by famous pieces of artwork and the 2000 film Gladiator.

But what is the real importance of our thumbs (digitus pollex), and how did it really function in the gladiatorial games of Ancient Rome?

The Romans were unique in comparison to other civilizations in referring to the thumb as its own digit on the hand, and it’s suggested that they believed it to have power or hold sway (polleat) over the rest of the fingers. The Latin word for thumb, pollex, is also said to have derived from the word for power, pollet. So we can see here just how much influence a gesture with the thumb had.

In the days of the gladiatorial games, the audience could have their say in deciding the fate of the fallen combatants with a hand gesture – what we think of as thumbs up or thumbs down in today’s misconstrued pop culture-reliant society. The decision to kill the fallen gladiator was decided with what is know as the pollice verso – which translates only as “turned thumb”. If we look at Juvenal, he says:

to-day they hold shows of their own, and win applause by slaying whomsoever the mob with a turn of the thumb bids them slay. (Juvenal; Satire III 36)

The Christian poet Prudentius also backs this up when talking about a Vestal Virgin watching the games:

The modest virgin with a turn of her thumb bids him pierce the breast of his fallen foe (Prudentius; Against Symmachus II)

We aren’t sure what this exactly means though, and there are no other proper surviving texts to give us specific insight. Contrary to popular belief, the “thumbs up” we all know today as a sign of a good job or to show that everything is A-OK did not always have this meaning. A study by Desmod Morris shows that Italians did not consider this action as a positive one until American pilots, who used it to signal to the grounds crew that they were ready to take off, imported it in WWII.

So we don’t really know which way the audience’s thumbs were pointing to indicate if they wanted the gladiator to die.

But if an extended, turned thumb indicated the kill, what did the audience do if they wanted to spare the gladiator’s life? Martial stated that the crowd appealed for mercy by waving their handkerchiefs (XII) or by shouting (Spectacles, X).

It seems the gesture was possibly to hide your thumb inside of your fist known as the pollice compresso or “compressed thumb”. Anthony Corbeill, the leading expert on ancient Roman gestures has translated Pliny’s pollices premere to mean that a thumb pressed down on the index finger of a closed fist signified mercy.

There’s some speculation with the reasoning behind these two gestures. Firstly, it’s a lot easier to tell the difference from the crowd. Second, it could indicate the state of the gladiator’s sword. Extended thumb indicating that the audience wanted the gladiator to give the conquered one final stab or blow, and the compressed thumb telling the victor to sheath his weapon and grant mercy on the defeated.

Archaeologically speaking, the The Médaillon de Cavillargues, located in the Nîmes Musée Archéologique supports Corbeill’s conclusions. Also interesting to note, the gladiator may have had to wait for a judgment call from the producer of the games to know the true outcome from the audience vote – waiting for an audible cue in the form of a horn or some music, which is suggested in the Zliten mosaic.

One of the most famous paintings depicting gladiatorial combat is called the Pollice Verso, painted in 1872 by famous historical painter Jean-Léon Jérôme. It displays a victorious gladiator standing over his vanquished opponent, showing off to a crowd enthusiastically thrusting their thumbs down. Jérôme was a highly respected historical painter, known for his extensive research and accuracy, which is why this misrepresentation lead to so many misunderstandings from the general public and fellow academics.

Raven Todd DaSilva is working on her Master’s in art conservation at the University of Amsterdam. Having studied archaeology and ancient history, she started Dig it With Raven to make archaeology, history and conservation exciting and freely accessible to everyone. You can follow all her adventures on Facebook and Instagram @digitwithraven

Resources

The Gladiator and the Thumb

“Thumbs in Ancient Rome: pollex as Index.” Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 42 (1997) 61-81 Anthony Corbeill

Juvenal Satire Book 3

Nature Embodied: Gesture in Ancient Rome (2004) by Anthony Corbeill

Zliten Mosaic

Pollice Verso

I’d like to thank Raven for taking the time to share this fascinating research with us. To be honest, I had no idea the Romans thought of the thumb as a digit that held sway over the other fingers!

You can read more by checking out the list of resources above.

If you have any questions for Raven about the ‘turn of the thumb’, you can ask them in the comments below.

Also, be sure to check out her website Dig It With Raven where she has a wealth of information on archaeology, history and art restoration.

Raven also posts regular VLOGS about archaeology and art restoration that are fascinating and highly informative. She’s also really funny! For anyone wanting to get their feet wet in these subject areas, I can’t recommend the videos enough. Make sure you subscribe to her YouTube channel so you don’t miss any of her awesome and educational videos.

We’ll definitely have Raven back on the blog!

Thanks for stopping by, and thank you for reading!