giovedì 11 aprile 2024

The main historical errors in the movie "Gladiator"

 The Ridley Scott's  movie “Gladiator” was a success at the box office, but it has different historical mistakes in it. Let’s see the main ones:

1. When Maximus fights at the beginning of the movie, he says “At my signal, unleash hell", but the plot takes place in pre-Christian age. The main character should have said “At my signal unleash the Underworld!”

2. The anfitheater of Rome, where the fighting are taken, in the movie is called Collosseum, but the Romans of that age would have call it “Anfitheater Flavius".

3. The main character of the movie is nicknamed “Ispanicus", but this word was not created yet. They would have nicknamed him “Ibericus"

4. Maximus have the rank of “General" in the army, but the equivalent rank in the roman army was “Legatus" or “Tribunus”

5. In the movie a crossbow appears. This weapon was first used in the middle age.

6. The Emperor Marcus Aurelius was not killed by Commodus, but by disease.

7. The Emperor Commodus was not killed by a rebel gladiator, but he died because of a conspiracy held by his wrestling teacher Narcissus, who was an ex gladiator.

8. When, in the last scene, Maximus buries the small statues, you can see, behind the Colosseum, the Domus Aurea's lake. But this was impossible because that lake was emptied to be able to build there the Colosseum.

9. The quote “Ave, Caesar, morituri te salutant” was not said by the gladiators, but by those who had been sentenced to death.

10. At the end of a fight between gladiators, when one was on top of the other, the Emperor will have to choose between the life or the death of the one who was defeated. The gestures used were not the thumb up or thumb down. He showed only the thumb, with the other fingers of the hand closed, to represent a sword skewering a body (death). He did the gesture of the thumb that is going under the other fingers of the hand, creating a punch, to represent the sword that is going in his sheath (life).


RATING: 4 out of 10

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