Entertainment Roman-style

2nd October, 2009

On Thursday 1st October, we welcomed to Packwood Matthew Clark (a Classics teacher at Shrewsbury School) who entertained forms 1, 2, 3 and some of form 4, with a fascinating talk on gladiators and chariot racing.

Mr Clark kept the children enthralled with stories of the Circus Maximus - the race track in Rome with its astonishing capacity for 250,000 spectators - and the Colosseum, or Flavian Amphitheatre, where the gladiators famously fought to the death in front of cheering crowds. We learned about how people would support their chariot teams very much like modern football supporters follow their clubs, dropping a favourite charioteer immediately if he changed team; and we learned that women too might become gladiators. Parallels were also drawn with Formula One motor racing, where accidents very often used to be fatal, as was the case in Roman times when a chariot might turn over or the horses fall; then their driver could be trampled underfoot or dragged behind the remains of his chariot, unless he was able to cut himself loose from the reins with his dagger.

After the talk, Mr Clark was inundated with perceptive and interesting questions from the children keen to learn as much as they could about Roman-style entertainment.