The public images of gladiators and other arena fighters, as well as the way they were treated outside the arena, reflected the Romans' own unique cultural and social values. Roman society was clearly fascinated by and highly preoccupied with gladiators and the amphitheater games. Yet the relationship between society and arena fighters was not one of love but, rather, of love-hate.

A Bad Reputation

Indeed, when it came to gladiators, most Romans were caught up in an obsessive and seemingly contradictory form of hero worship. On the one hand, socially speaking these warriors were viewed as debased, worthless, and undignified low-life, and like actors and other entertainers, gladiators bore the degrading stigma of infamia ("bad reputation"). The second-century- B. C. Latin writer Calpurnius Flaccus put it bluntly: "There is no meaner condition among the people than...