The gladiators of ancient Rome are nearly always imagined as figures of perfect physical presence. They’re popularly pictured as lean, muscular and bronzed from their bouts under the Mediterranean sun.

But as classical historian Harry Sidebottom explains on the HistoryExtra podcast, the reality was far stranger, and more complex. Sidebottom, the author of Those Who Are About To Die: Gladiators and the Roman Mind, says that Roman gladiators were impossible to compare to professional athletes today. They were brutalised, scarred, physically lopsided and, as Sidebottom reveals, surprisingly well-padded.

Their appearance, and the way Romans responded to it, reveals much about the ancient Roman world’s obsessions with violent spectacle.

“On the one hand, gladiators are the lowest of the low,” Sidebottom says. “But on the other hand, they’re very glamorous figures; even sex symbols.”

A brutal Roman tradition

Gladiatorial combat had deep roots in Roman culture. In the third century BC, aristocratic families began to honour the dead with munera; ritual combats staged in memory of the deceased. Over time this would evolve into public entertainment, sponsored by politicians seeking popularity.

By the time of the late Roman Republic, games were vast civic events. Julius Caesar staged spectacles featuring hundreds of pairs of fighters, and by the early Roman empire, Roman emperors from Augustus to Commodus used the arena as a means of displaying their power and prestige. The most famous venue, the Colosseum in Rome, commissioned by Vespasian and opened under Titus in AD 80, could seat 50,000 spectators.

Gladiators came from across the empire. They were prisoners of war, condemned criminals, and enslaved men trained in state-run martial schools known as ludi. The largest, including sites like Ludus Magnus and Capua, housed thousands of fighters under the watch of strict trainers. Though most entered unwillingly, some free men also volunteered, tempted by the prospect of fame.

Different gladiator types, such as the lightly armed retiarius with his net and trident, or the heavily armoured secutor with his curved shield and sword, were pitted against one another for maximum drama.

Many gladiators would become famous for their feats, adored by the Roman public.

This 3rd-century AD mosaic from the House of the Gladiators in Kourion, Cyprus, depicts two fighters — Hellenikos and Margarites — sparring with blunt weapons. (Photo by Getty Images)

A Roman diet designed for spectacle

But the work that went into achieving that adoration required more than fighting in the arenas. It was a full-time job, with a very specific diet that went along with it.

“A Roman gladiator was very much not the ripped Hollywood star we’ve come to know,” Sidebottom explains.

“They were fed a diet of something called sagina … barley and bean stew. It was carbohydrate rich and designed to build up a thick layer of subcutaneous fat, the idea being they can actually take a wound and bleed in an almost cinematic, visual way. But the blade won’t hit any vital organs.

“So, gladiators were quite fat.”

• Read more | What did people eat in Ancient Rome?

The fact that fighters could bleed dramatically without dying too quickly was the whole idea, ramping up the spectacle of gladiatorial battles. The crowd wanted to see wounded fighters, not lifeless corpses.

“They also had a special drink,” say Sidebottom.

“They drank ash diluted in wine to build up calcium … forensic pathologists have looked at the skeletons and, yes, [the remains] have an abnormally high level of ash.”

Excavations at the gladiator cemetery in Ephesus in modern-day Turkey confirm this. Bone analysis shows unusually high calcium levels, which would have strengthened gladiators’ skeletons against impact.

Along with the food, it was an early form of sports nutrition.

This 3rd-century AD mosaic from the House of the Gladiators in Kourion, Cyprus, shows the fighter Lytras being separated from his opponent by a referee. (Photo by Getty Images)

The toll of gladiatorial training

Gladiatorial training was constant, repetitive and punishing, and this may have taken a heavy toll on the gladiators’ bodies.

“They might have looked almost deformed because of the heavy and relentless training,” says Sidebottom. “You begin to almost look lopsided.”

Sidebottom compares the effect to that on medieval longbowmen, whose skeletons show exaggerated muscle growth on one side. Like longbowmen, gladiators also developed uneven musculature and asymmetrical frames.

This, combined with scars and the impact of injuries, meant that these men were far from the idealised physiques that are imagined today.

• Read more | Meet the people the ancient Romans and Greeks desperately tried to hide

But for the Romans, that had its own unique appeal.

“They actually become attractive almost because of the fact that they’re not conventionally pretty,” he says.

Still, gladiators were clearly conscious of the way they looked, and attempted to shape how their images were remembered.

“It’s interesting that the tombstones aren’t photorealistic,” Sidebottom says. “In the western half of the empire, their tombstones make them look like soldiers… In the eastern half … they try and look like athletes.”

Sidebottom thinks this was an attempt to apply a retrospective sense of respectability and dignity to people who were seen as some of the lowest in society during their lives.

The real gladiators of Rome?

The truth of how gladiators looked and lived is both harsher and more revealing than the simplified image of a muscular athlete.

These men were lowly labourers trained to fight with misshapen bodies that were designed to provide the maximum possible spectacle. And that took an immense – and perhaps unexpected – toll.

Harry Sidebottom was speaking to Rachel Dinning on the HistoryExtra podcast. Listen to the full conversation.

Caesar: Death of a Dictator

Member exclusive | On the Ides of March 44 BC, the most famous Roman in history was murdered. Julius Caesar’s assassination transformed Rome forever, and the image of his bloody toga has haunted monarchs and tyrants ever since.

Listen to all episodes now