erect in the chariot. The weight of the heavy golden wreath studded with precious stones in his head makes him reel, and a slave has to ride in the chariot with him to hold the wreath in place. The young man is wearing a purple toga covered with gold braid and trying to manage the reins of his chariot and hold up his ivory sceptre with its golden eagle at the same time. Luckily for him the reins are simply for show; the zebras are being led by experienced trainers. The crowd gives him an ironic cheer. If the games come up to expectations, they'll give him a real cheer and elect him to office.
A group of musicians march before the chariot playing for all they're worth on horns, fifes and flutes. There is also the usual group of clients surrounding the chariot in their white robes as well as slaves holding up placards saying for what office the young noble is running. After the chariot comes a long series of floats drawn by horses, mules and elephants. On each float is a statue of a god or goddess with priests burning incense on an altar before the image, or a group of young men and girls posing to represent some mythological tableau. This procession circles the arena to cheers, catcalls, and cries of: 'Get down from that chariot and let your mother ride!' and 'Oh, I think you're cute, sugar plum. Meet me under the stands and you'll get my vote.' These long, formal parades were regarded as a waste of time by the mob and there was even a proverbial expression: 'Tiresome as a circensian procession' But, like TV commercials, they were necessary; the editor giving the show wanted people to remember for whom to vote.
The insipid young man descends from the chariot, staggering with weariness, and is half led by his slaves to his place in the podium where his mother is already seated. He collapses with a sigh. Slaves remove his gold wreath, and he tries to wipe the sweat off his face with the sleeve of his gown. His mother stops him with an angry gesture.
A trumpet sounds, announcing the entrance of the Emperor Domitian. He enters his box from the rear. The royal box was raised above the podium on a dais. Four columns, each surmounted by a statue of victory, supported a canopy over it, Domitian was a great enthusiast for the games as long as they were cruel enough. (When there were no games, he used to amuse himself sticking pins in flies.) He is a potbellied man with large, watery eyes and completely bald. His private life was such that he was popularly referred to as 'the old goat' During the games, he always kept a little boy with an extremely small head by his side and discussed the various events with him, apparently thinking that the deformed child possessed some supernatural ability to pick the winning chariot or best gladiator. Domitian maintained his own school of gladiators and was finally murdered by one of them, hired for that purpose by a group of ambitious politicians.
Domitian doesn't get much of a hand. He isn't giving the games and is unpopular anyway, being regarded as something of a tightwad.. The Vestal Virgins enter in their white robes and seat themselves in their box next to the emperor's. Then to another trumpet blast comes the parade of the combatants; the charioteers in their chariots, the gladiators marching in rank after rank, elephants carrying howdahs full of armed men, Nubians on horseback, cavalry from the royal household troop, trained lions led on chains by bestiarii, ostriches drawing light chariots, snake charmers with pythons wrapped around them, male and female bullfighters naked except for loincloths, men in elaborate costumes riding giraffes, stags, antelopes and even a tame rhinoceros, cages drawn by horses containing some of the rarer animals recently brought to Rome, and a group of pygmies from the Ituri Forest in Central Africa.
There are also Parthian bowmen, Syrian slingers, redheaded Irishmen carrying shillelaghs, Assyrians with flails, Egyptians with boomerang hatchets, African stone-throwers, Essedarii who use lassos from chariots, Germans with javelins, Sikhs from India with sharp throwing rings, Laplanders with spears and spear-throwers, and inhabitants of the Andaman Islands with harpoons. Little boys dressed as cupids with toy bows and arrows run about shooting light shafts into the crowd, each with a lottery ticket attached to the head. Groups of pretty young girls, nude except for garlands of flowers around their waists, scatter rose petals under the feet of the procession, and dwarfs dressed in extravagant costumes, many with huge, brightly coloured phalli strapped to their loins, run about, tumbling, doing handstands, and performing simple acrobatic tricks. A detachment of the Praetoria Guard, their gold armour gleaming in the subdued light, brings up the rear of the procession.
After circling the arena to wild applause, the procession formed before the royal podium and saluted Domitian. They then saluted the young editor who was caught off guard and had to be angrily prompted by his mother before he remembered to rise and make the proper response. Most of the performers left the arena, but the gladiators lingered, swaggering around before the crowd and shouting to pretty girls, 'Here's your chance, sweetheart, embrace me before death does.' Some of the gladiators who were proud of their figures were completely naked except for garlands of flowers on their heads; their bodies shining with olive oil. Instead of weapons, they carried palm branches. These men flexed their muscles hooking the fingers of one hand under the fingers of the other and straining to make their biceps stand out or, raising both arms at their sides, threw back their shoulders. The crowd shouted and screamed with delight, most of the v/omen looking down coyly but managing to steal a glance out of the corners of their eyes at the magnificent figures before them. Shouts of: 'My money's on you, Primus!' 'Give 'em the cold steel, Pamphilus!' went up, and there was a desperate last-minute checking of names, odds, and weapons on the programmes.
When the arena was cleared, there came a moment's hush. Then the trumpet sounded and immediately hundreds of wild animals began to pour into the arena. This was the usual opening for the games—a venation or wild beast hunt.
The numbers and variety of animals in one of these hunts were astonishing. Martial says that there were nine thousand animals killed in these six-day games. There were deer, wild boars, bears, bulls, antelopes, ibex, jackals, ostriches, cranes, wild horses, hyenas, leopards and a herd of domestic cattle put in for 'padding.' The whole arena seemed covered with a patchwork quilt of various coloured skins. Fights were constantly breaking out but the arena was so crowded and the animals so terrified that by mere weight of numbers the contestants were jostled apart and swept away from each other as the frantic creatures tried to find some way to escape.
The delighted crowd, shouting and counting eagerly on their fingers how many animals there were (for each show had to be bigger than the last), never gave a thought to the enormous labour and astonishing efficiency that made it possible to deliver all these different animals into the arena at the same instant.
When the crowd's interest in the swarming, fighting animals began to lag, foxes with firebrands tied to their ails were set loose. The foxes darted through the packed mass, causing terror wherever they went, while the mob screamed with delight. Domitian, his sluggish nature titivated by the sight of struggling, helpless beasts, shouted for his bow. The fat emperor was an excellent shot and used to practice his markmanship on captive animals on his Alban estate. He was handed a powerful sinew-backed bow from Persia, so flexible that when the bow was unstrung, the curve of the bow was the reverse of that taken up when the string was attached. A slave strung the bow while the podgy ruler danced with impatience and another slave held out a quiver filled with arrows feathered with peacock trains. Domitian began to shoot into the packed animals while the crowd cheered him on. Often he was able to send one arrow through an animal and hit another on the other side. To exhibit his skill, he would shoot two arrows into an animal's head so they resembled horns. After shooting over a hundred of the animals, he ordered a slave to jump into the arena, run to the middle, and hold out his hand with the fingers spread. Domitian sent arrows between the fingers while the crowd yelled with delighted surprise and the patricians politely applauded. As the arena was still full of frantic animals, the slave had quite a job avoiding their wild rushes, and between watching out for the animals and keeping an eye on Domitian, he had a lively time. The crowd thought the slave's antics were excruciatingly funny and laughed until they cried. Suddenly a bull charged the man from behind and tossed him. The slave came down between two bears who instantly seized him and began pulling their victim apart. His cries sounded above the lowing of the cattle and the screams of the wild horses who were kicking on the sand with arrows sticking in them.
Domitian waited with an arrow on the string and a broad smile on his face until the slave was dead. Then with two expert shots, he killed both of the bears and sat down wiping his plump face to thunderous applause.
Now was the turn of the professional venatores, among them Carpophorus. These men entered the arena from the same openings that had emitted the animals. Each group of venatores could be instantly identified by the crowd from their equipment. Some men carried only a veil and a long dagger for the bears. Others were in full armour, like gladiators, to receive the charge of the bulls. Others carried spears with a round metal disc halfway up the haft. These would fight the wild boars, the disc being to prevent the boar forcing himself along the spear
