LONDON, Sept. 12 — No one knows her name, or how she died, but archaeologists think she was a gladiator in Roman London. And, from the evidence, a very popular one.
THE EXISTENCE of female gladiators in Roman times has long been known to historians, but now what are believed to be the first remains of one — a young woman in her 20s, buried with high honors — have been unearthed at a Roman cemetery in London.
The Museum of London displayed the evidence for the first time Tuesday.
Only a piece of the young woman’s pelvis escaped the flames of her funeral pyre — enough to say that she was in her 20s.
The belief that she may have been a gladiator comes from the ceramics buried with her in what was a walled cemetery on the south bank of the River Thames, in present-day Southwark.
One dish was decorated with a fallen gladiator and other vessels with symbols associated with gladiators, said Hedley Swain of the Museum of London.
Three lamps found in the grave were decorated with images of the Egyptian god Anubis. This jackal-headed deity was associated with the Roman god Mercury, and Swain noted that slaves dressed as Mercury were employed to drag away the bodies from amphitheaters.
“The fact that we have this association with gladiators indicates that she was a gladiator, or someone deeply involved with gladiators,” said Jenny Hall, curator of early London history at the London Museum.
“It is obviously quite a wealthy burial,” she added.
Want to learn more? http://www.msnbc.com/news/458931.asp
----------------------------
Alien - Administrator / Owner
["Everything was true. God was an alien. Oz really is over the
rainbow. ...and Midian is where the monsters live." -Nightbreed]
THE EXISTENCE of female gladiators in Roman times has long been known to historians, but now what are believed to be the first remains of one — a young woman in her 20s, buried with high honors — have been unearthed at a Roman cemetery in London.
The Museum of London displayed the evidence for the first time Tuesday.
Only a piece of the young woman’s pelvis escaped the flames of her funeral pyre — enough to say that she was in her 20s.
The belief that she may have been a gladiator comes from the ceramics buried with her in what was a walled cemetery on the south bank of the River Thames, in present-day Southwark.
One dish was decorated with a fallen gladiator and other vessels with symbols associated with gladiators, said Hedley Swain of the Museum of London.
Three lamps found in the grave were decorated with images of the Egyptian god Anubis. This jackal-headed deity was associated with the Roman god Mercury, and Swain noted that slaves dressed as Mercury were employed to drag away the bodies from amphitheaters.
“The fact that we have this association with gladiators indicates that she was a gladiator, or someone deeply involved with gladiators,” said Jenny Hall, curator of early London history at the London Museum.
“It is obviously quite a wealthy burial,” she added.
Want to learn more? http://www.msnbc.com/news/458931.asp
----------------------------
Alien - Administrator / Owner
["Everything was true. God was an alien. Oz really is over the
rainbow. ...and Midian is where the monsters live." -Nightbreed]
