Disability as Entertainment: Roman Slaves

 

Welcome to my latest blog post on disability as entertainment. Following on from last weeks post on disability in the Roman arena, I will be examining what life was like for disabled Roman slaves. Well technically, they weren’t actually Roman citizens as they were slaves, but that is just a minor detail.

Romans preferred Cripples?

It is a well-known fact that Roman citizens owned slaves. As bizarre as it seems to us today, possessing slaves was perfectly normal and even expected in Ancient Rome. This ranged from a typical household having one or two, to wealthier Romans having a Downtown Abbey style army of servants. The Romans were so effective at enslaving others, that some have estimated that slaves outnumbered freemen three to one. Understandably, the Roman elite were always worried about slave revolts. This may be one of the reasons why the Romans preferred disabled slaves. It was probably easier to escape an attacker with one leg, for instance.

Deformed slaves were a common sight in Rome. This is due in part to the fact that slaves undertook intensive labour and were often put in dangerous situations, resulting in injury. However, this is not the only way Romans acquired deformed slaves. Quintilian, a Roman educator, and rhetorician stated that ‘some people set a higher value on human bodies which are crippled or somehow deformed than on those which have lost none of the blessing of normality’. It is clear from this that disabled slaves were a sought-after commodity. So much so, that Plutarch records the existence of a ‘monster-market’ in the city. He describes all of the weird and wonderful things that could be purchased there. These include people ‘who have no calves, or are waeselarmed, or have three eyes, or ostrich-heads’. Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I have ever come across a person with an ostrich head. It seems a tad bit unrealistic, but fascinating, nonetheless. These ‘Commingled’ shapes and ‘misformed’ prodigies as Plutarch calls them, were put on display to be gawked at and examined by the public.

It was not only people with pre-existing deformities that were popular with the Romans. Some people even disfigured their slaves to increase their value. I know what you are probably thinking, why on earth would disfiguring someone increase their value? To answer that question, we have to leave reality and enter the realm of the supernatural [insert spooky ghost noises here]. As with most things in daily Roman life, the gods and spirits played a key role. The Romans believed in the Evil Eye of Envy. It was thought that this could have serious effects on the person the Eye set its gaze on. In order to combat this, the Romans used deformed people. The deformity acted to draw the attention of the Eye, thus protecting the original target. The hump on a hunchback was deemed to be the most effective at this. Hence why hunchbacks were commonplace in the imperial court. So, there you have it, instead of using Evil Eye necklaces and bracelets, which is common today, Romans used disabled people!!

 

Terracotta dancing dwarf, late 3rd century B.C.E., Rhode Island School of Design, Museum. Providence, Rhode Island. Garland (1995) figure 6.

Dwarf Clowns

Dwarfs were popular entertainers in Rome and not only as gladiators as I mentioned last week. Usually, dwarf slaves would be made to perform if their master had guests over. This could take the form of singing, or dancing, or just making a fool out of themselves. In short, they were clowns. The satirist Lucian tells of an incident involving such a clown named Satyrion. Satyrion ‘danced, doubling himself up and twisting himself about to cut a more ridiculous figure’. He was clearly intending to make his master’s guests laugh. After this, ‘he began to poke fun at the guests’. Unfortunately for Satyrion, one of them, named Alcidamas, took offence and challenged him to a fight. Being a slave, Satyrion could not refuse and therefore the fight began. Lucian remarks how ‘It was delicious to see a philosopher squaring off at a clown, and giving and receiving blows in turn’. The difference in height certainly would have made an interesting spectacle. The fact that Satyrion actually won the fight makes the event even funnier for those that witnessed it.

Satyrion is not the only example of when a deformed slave was humiliated for entertainment purposes. The Historia Augusta, which is a collection of biographies of the Roman emperors, includes a misdeed of Commodus (yes him again). In my last post, I mentioned how he caved in the skulls of some cripples with a club. This time he was said to have ‘displayed two misshapen hunchbacks on a silver platter after smearing them with mustard, and then straightway advanced and enriched them’. It makes it seem as though the hunchbacks were just a plaything. At least he paid them. That’s a positive, I suppose. Stories such as this indicate that owners of disabled slaves received the most from them, by humiliating them for entertainment.

As you can see, disabled slaves in Ancient Rome were highly prized possessions, but they were humiliated for entertainment.

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Next week I will be looking into the intriguing tale of Matthias Buchinger, the deformed entertainer.

 

                                                                                                         The Wheelchair Historian

 

Further Reading

Brignell, Victoria, ‘Ancient world’, 7 April 2008 https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/crips-column/2008/04/disabled-slaves-child-roman Accessed: 9^th October, 2020.

Facts and Details, ‘Slaves In Ancient Rome: Numbers, Sources And Laws’, Last updated October 2018 http://factsanddetails.com/world/cat56/sub369/entry-6302.html Accessed: 9^th October, 2020.

Garland, Robert, 1995. The Eye of the Beholder: Deformity and Disability in the Graeco-Roman World (London). 

Lampridius, Aelius, Historia Augusta, Commodus. Translated by David Magie (January 1921), 7.11.2.

Lucian, The Carousal (Symposium) or The Lapiths Translated by A. M. Harmon (January 1913), 18.

Malamud, Martha, “That’s Entertainment! Dining With Domitian in the Silvae.” Ramus 30.1 (2001), 23-45.

Plutarch, ‘On Being a Busybody’ in Moralia, Volume VI Translated by W. C. Helmbold (January 1939), 520 C p. 501.

Quintilian, ‘The Orator’s Education’ in The Orator's Education, Volume I: Books 1-2, edited and translated by Donald A. Russell (January 2002) 2.5. 11-12.

Spectacular Antiquity, ‘Dwarfs in the Roman Arena’, https://spectacularantiquity.wordpress.com/case-studies/public/dwarfs-in-the-arena/ Accessed: 9^th October 2020.

Disability as Entertainment: Roman Arena

 

Welcome to my new series focusing on disability as entertainment. Throughout history, people with disabilities, especially physical deformities, have been put on display to be gawked, mocked, and laughed at. Interestingly, this seems to be a constant theme, where history repeats itself over and over again. I will attempt to work in chronological order, starting in Ancient Rome and working up to present day. However, I may discover something along the way which will force me to travel back in time.

The most obvious place to start is the Colosseum, where the Roman public went to be entertained. I will be discussing the role of dwarfs in the Colosseum and I shall explain why presently.

 

Are Dwarfs Even Disabled?

I feel it is important to explain some terminology. Although dwarf can now be interpreted as an offensive term, it is used by academics, as that is what the Romans called them. For this reason, I will also be using the term dwarf.

You may now be wondering if dwarfism is even a disability. The short answer is, it’s complicated. There has been some academic debate on that very question. I think the simplest thing to do is to give my take on the situation and explain why I am focusing on dwarfs this week. Brace yourself for some more terminology. According to dictionary.com, the definition of disability is ‘a physical or mental handicap, especially one that hinders or prevents a person from performing tasks of daily living, carrying out work or household responsibilities, or engaging in leisure and social activities’. Judging by this definition, I would say that having dwarfism can indeed be disabling in certain circumstances. Personally, sitting in a wheelchair, there are things I cannot reach on shelves etc., because they are too high up for me, which is disabling.

In the context of Ancient Rome, I would definitely consider dwarfs to be disabled. Not only would they have experienced hindrances due to their short stature, their physical difference meant that they were not seen as human. I will go into greater detail on this in another post, but basically, the Romans believed that deformity granted people special powers. The key reason that dwarfs are the main focus of this post is a matter of necessity. Simply put, there is not a whole amount of source material related to other disabilities. This may be due to disabled babies and children not surviving into adulthood. It could also be possible that they were just not noteworthy enough to record.

   

Fighting Dwarfs

Dwarfs are known to have fought in amphitheatres, such as the Colosseum. However, there is some disagreement as to how this played out. For instance, it has widely been believed that women fought dwarfs in the arena. However, this may not be true. It all depends on how you interpret the evidence. According to the Roman historian, Cassius Dio,

“Often he [Domitian] would conduct the games also at night, and sometimes he would pit dwarfs and women against each other”.

At first glance, it appears as if he is saying that dwarfs fought women. This is highly unlikely, as a woman would have a huge advantage over a dwarf, resulting in a quick and dull contest. I think the crowd would not be entertained! Instead, I believe the above quote should be read as dwarfs fought dwarfs and women fought women. This would have led to much fairer fights and would have been much more enjoyable (for the audience at least). There is evidence, including statuettes, which suggest that dwarfs would compete in boxing matches against each other. These matches usually took place as the warmup act before the main bloodshed began. I suppose in a sense, the dwarfs got off lightly.

A common occurrence in the arena was for mythological scenes to be recreated. Dwarfs were used to tell the tale of the ferocious battle between the Pygmies and their natural enemies, Cranes!! This is how the poet Statius described the event,

“Then in turn come forth the bold battalions of dwarfs, whom Nature from their birth cramped and bound once for all into a knotted lump. These join in battle and deal wounds; see, with Lilliputian hands they menace each his fellow with death; while Father Mars and murderous Valour, and the cranes, ere in random raid they pounce, marvel at the courage of the pygmies.”

This particular translation is from 1908, hence the old timey language.

Commodus as Hercules

 

I cannot finish this post without telling you the story of the time a bunch of cripples had their heads caved in. As anyone who has seen the movie Gladiator can attest, Commodus was not a nice guy. It’s reported that on one occasion, he gathered up every dwarf he could find and brought them to the Colosseum. He then let them loose in the arena with meat cleavers, until only one remained. On a separate occasion, he gathered people who had no feet and tied them up in a line at the centre of arena. He then proceeded to walk down the line, with a Hercules-style club, and smashed each of their heads in.

I think it is safe to say that it was probably best to steer clear of the Colosseum if you were disabled in Ancient Rome.

To keep up to date with my latest blog posts, you can like my Facebook page, or follow me on Twitter. You can find them by clicking the relevant icons in the sidebar.

Next week I will stick with Ancient Rome but focus on what it was like to be a disabled slave.

 

                                                                                                                   The Wheelchair Historian

 

Further Reading

Aeilia, Cleopatra, ‘General Misconceptions about Gladiators and Munera’,
http://www.societasviaromana.net/Collegium_Historicum/misconceptions.php Accessed: 2nd October, 2020.

Brunet, Stephen, ‘Dwarfs in Early Imperial Spectacles’, https://camws.org/meeting/2008/program/abstracts/07b4.Brunet.html Accessed: 2nd October, 2020.

Brunet, Stephen, ‘Women with Swords: Female Gladiators in the Roman World’, 2014 https://sites.middlebury.edu/gsaw/files/2016/02/women-with-swords.pdf Accessed: 2nd October, 2020.

Conliffe, Ciaran, ‘Commodus, Roman Emperor and Gladiator’, Last updated Mar 29, 2019, https://www.headstuff.org/culture/history/terrible-people-from-history/commodus-roman-emperor-gladiator/ Accessed: 2nd October, 2020.

Dio, Cassius, Roman History, 67.8.2 http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/e/roman/texts/cassius_dio/67*.html Accessed: 2^nd October, 2020.

Jeffery, Simon, ‘Gladiators: Everything you need to know about bloodthirsty Roman entertainment on the net’, Fri 12 May 2000, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2000/may/12/netnotes.simonjeffery Accessed: 2nd October, 2020.

Oliver, Mark, ‘10 Crazy Shows Romans Could Watch At The Colosseum’, November 25, 2016 https://listverse.com/2016/11/25/10-crazy-shows-romans-could-watch-at-the-colosseum/ Accessed: 2^nd October, 2020.

Spectacular Antiquity, ‘Dwarfs in the Roman Arena’, https://spectacularantiquity.wordpress.com/case-studies/public/dwarfs-in-the-arena/ Accessed: 2^nd October, 2020.