Big Screen Rome - Amazon Web Services

gladiator could drop his weapon and raise his left hand to signal an appeal
for mercy, while the victor would turn to the crowd to see their reaction.
If the defeated gladiator had fought bravely, the crowd might yell Mitte!
“Let him go!” But if the crowd thought the man had performed poorly, if
he had flinched or tried to run away, they felt insulted by his inadequacy
and yelled Iugula! “Kill him!” Then all eyes would turn to the special
seating area of the editor, either the emperor or a wealthy sponsor of the
games, who had the final word whether to take or spare the gladiator’s life.
Controversy rages over the actual hand gestures used by the ancient
crowd and the editor to signal life or death for combatants in the arena.
While no ancient source describes the exact gestures, it seems likely the
extended thumb represented the sword and turning it represented the
motion of the sword. However, the contemporary idea seen in Roman
epic films of thumbs up meaning “let him live” and thumbs down meaning
“kill him” is almost certainly incorrect. This popular misconception of
the gestures may arise from the depiction of an arena scene in an influential
French painting by Jean-Léon Gérôme called Pollice Verso, “With
Thumb Turned” (1872). The painting shows a gladiator standing over
and about to kill his fallen competitors, while the rabid mob in the stands
is signaling a full thumbs down. In fact, based on representations from
ancient art, some historians suggest the exact opposite: thumbs up was the
signal for death, meaning “stick it to him,” while the signal for life was
thumbs down, meaning “drop the sword.” Alternately, audiences may
have called for a gladiator to be killed by raising a fist closed around the
thumb, literally to bury the sword in the victim’s body, while to leave the
thumb exposed in any direction would have been to show mercy and
leave the sword unburied.
This controversy, relying as it does on the subjective interpretation
of visual depictions, may never be settled. If the editor called for death,
the victorious gladiator would finish off his fallen opponent, while the
crowd roared Habet! “He’s got it!” The dead man was carted off through
the Gate of Death, his equipment recovered, and his body dumped in a
pit. The victor was declared a hero in the arena and presented with a palm
branch and cash prizes. A gladiator who won or bought his freedom was
presented with a rudis, or wooden sword, to signify his right to retire and
enjoy his fame and fortune.
Contrary to the plot of Gladiator, Marcus Aurelius did not ban gladiatorial
matches during his reign as emperor. However, he may have
created a serious shortage of gladiators by drafting them for his northern
wars, thereby making the games even more expensive than usual (Ward,
GLADIATOR (2000) 221