Gladiators return to arena after 2,000 years

LONDON: Gladiators are now set to return to the Colosseum after a gap of 2,000 years, which once featured their fights with wild animals. Umberto Broccoli, the head of archaeology at Rome city council, said that he would like the five million people, who visit the Colosseum annually, to see how and what kind of fights had taken place there originally.

He added that the wanted people to experience “the sights, sounds and smells” of Ancient Rome. Mauro Cutrufo, the deputy mayor, said that a series of events would be held next year to mark the two thousandth birth anniversary of Emperor Vespasian, during whose rule the Colosseum had been constructed.

It has yet to be decided where the mock combats will be held, but Broccoli has insisted that the fights would be authentic, with gladiators using the same weapons used earlier.

Asked if the planned shows might be thought vulgar, Broccoli answered that they would be everything. “The gladiators themselves were vulgar, they were sweaty, they stank and they swore. Why not show them as they were, for real?” Times Online quoted him
as saying.