Children of Pompeii ‘saw gladiators fight to the death’

Stick figures of gladiators fighting to the death apparently drawn by a child have been found on a newly excavated wall in Pompeii.

The child’s sketch of two gladiators squaring off while two others, armed with spears, close in on a pair of wild boar.

Stick figures of gladiators fighting to the death apparently drawn by a child have been found on a newly excavated wall in Pompeii, suggesting that children were taken to watch bloody combat at the Roman city’s arena, experts have said.

The discoveries were part of a series of finds, including a rare portrait of a small child wearing a hood, as archaeologists excavate the rooms in the ancient city for the first time.

Discovered at the house known as the Cenacolo Colonnato, the charcoal sketches show two gladiators squaring off while two others, armed with spears, seem to close in on their prey, a pair of wild boar.

Sketches on the wall in a nearby room, which is thought to have been used to store amphorae, feature more gladiators, two figures playing with a ball, another wild boar and a boxing match. One of the fighters is shown lying on the ground.

Drawn on the wall at a height of between 20cm and 50cm from the ground, and preserved by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD79 which buried the city, the sketches in the second room also include three small hands, as if the child or children had drawn an outline with their charcoal.

Gabriel Zuchtriegel, the site’s director, said psychologists from the University of Naples Federico II who had seen the sketches said the child had probably witnessed mortal gladiator combat in the flesh, rather than simply copying images.

“It is likely one or more children who played in this courtyard, between the kitchen, bathroom and kitchen garden, had been to see the fighting in the amphitheatre, witnessing extreme violence at a show which also featured the execution of slaves and criminals,” Mr Zuchtriegel said.

“The sketches show us the impact on the imagination of a young child who was going through the same type of development as children today. The stick figures are typical of the drawings of children now, part of an anthropological constant which has nothing to do with artistic and cultural trends.”

An inscription on a tomb discovered at Pompeii in 2017 revealed that gladiator shows in the city featured more than 400 combatants, far more than previously thought, and rivalling the better-known battles that played out at the Colosseum in Rome.

“Exposing children of around five to seven years old to extreme violence does not seem to be a problem today through video games and social media, but the difference is that in antiquity the blood shed in the arena was real, and few saw a problem, despite the possible impact on the mental health of children in Pompeii,” the archaeologists said in a statement.

Digging has also been under way at the nearby House of the Painters, where a rare fresco of a child wearing a hooded cloak has been found. Possibly the deceased child of the house’s owners, he or she is surrounded by large bunches of grapes and pomegranates and flanked by a small dog.

In a corridor of the house, the skeletons of a man and woman, both elderly, were found, lying where they had sought shelter from the shower of pumice and boiling ash that descended on the city.

Gennaro Sangiuliano, the Italian Culture Minister, said: “Increasingly frequently, Pompeii is producing marvellous discoveries which show it is an extraordinary collection of treasures.”

The Times