Stuff You Should Know - The Colosseum

Episode Date: May 9, 2023

It's funny how similar The Colosseum in Rome is to modern day arenas. They really had it figured out. Tune in today to learn all about this early entertainment venue. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck and Jerry's here, too. And this is Stuff You Should Know, as always. As ever. Chuck, I think we just broke our record for earliest edits in an episode. That came quick. You cleared your throat, and we, for some reason, are cutting it out. Because it's not good stuff.

Well, I want to hear that, do they? I don't know. Maybe weirdos. I think you and your 15, we've established our unprofessional qualities. It is true. Speaking of unprofessional qualities, you know who is terrible? Some of these emperors. Very nice segue.

Have you ever been to the Coliseum? You have, right? Yes. It's amazing. Did you go into it? Yes. I didn't go into it. I walked around it, and this was, my big European jaunt was when I was broke and backpacking.

So my friend and I did the best we could, but we did walk outside of a lot of structures that many other people pay to get into. You didn't have money for a pottery shard? No, we had no dough to get in these places, but it's just a wonder to walk around. I mean, that's what I love about Rome is just seeing stuff that old is just really humbling and cool. Rome is one of the very few cities that I've visited and been like, I could totally live here.

Oh, really? Yes, it's a neat town for sure. Part of it is because just be walking along and all of a sudden, the wall is suddenly 3,000 years old. It's just like that kind of place. Things are kind of built up on top of everything else, but stuff has been preserved or accidentally exposed. It's just a really neat town.

I loved it for sure. Yeah, and boy, just how good looking is everybody. Yeah, those Italians, they know what they're doing when they read. Oh, man. I was like, ooh, I'm in love with her and her, and I might be gay. Look at that guy. They are a good looking bunch, for sure. All of them are just so attractive, like on a Friday night at the Spanish steps, it's

just like, how many good looking, dark-haired people can you get together in one spot? Chuck, I think our most dedicated listeners know that you're just buttering up the Italians because you're going to be busting out some Italian accents, and you don't want her to be mad at you, or I should say you're all voiling them up. Very nice. That's a good one. I don't know if that was nice or good, but I appreciate the kudos. Yeah, but we're talking Colosseum, and it's interesting to me how like, and you might

have gotten all this stuff from the tour, but I was just kind of knocked out in this article that Olivia put together of how sort of modern, like modern stadium going experience it felt like. Yeah, and actually, there was one fact that stood out to me. I was like, well, they've got current stadiums beat. Basically, the packed cheek to jowl, you could fit 87,000 people in there, and the whole place could be emptied or filled within 15 minutes because the circulation was that beautifully engineered.

Yeah, I think that's a slightly dubious claim, but I bet it was quick and like nothing like it is today. Okay, 18, and I'm not going any higher than that. Well, and back then, you would just walk back to your place or take a mule or something like post-traffic experiences near American stadiums or the stuff of the legend. It's awful. Yes, for sure. Parking decks, ugh, worst thing ever invented.

They're pretty bad. They're awful. Yes, it's true. And you know, it's going to get a lot worse. They're developing that whole area that kind of no man's lane. It's like old train tracks and abandoned stuff in between State Farm Marina and Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the Gulch.

Yes, they're developing that. So it's just going to get a million times worse down there. They should just set up helicopter service and drop people in. Well, I think what they're doing is trying to be like, hey, don't jump in your car. Just go hang out at a bar or restaurant. Okay, I see where you're coming from. There's going to be stuff to do there. Yeah, because there's not right now.

No, there's not much. There's not a whole lot. There's some cool hotels down there, but they're kind of tiny. It's coming around a little bit. Yeah, for sure. So, but we're not talking about downtown and laying everybody, cool your horses. We're talking about the Coliseum, like you said. That was just kind of one fact, and I'm calling it a fact, Chuck, you're pooping in a little

bit, which is fine. We can agree to disagree on that, and I think you're probably right. But still, it kind of underscores how everybody in history has looked back at the Coliseum as just this marvel of engineering and design and architecture. It was built in like eight years astoundingly enough, and it's survived earthquakes and all sorts of terrible catastrophes, and it's still standing in a lot, pretty good shape considering how old it is, 2,000 years. But what I didn't know when I was there.

I knew, but it didn't really sink in. It is one of the most despicable places ever built in the history of Western civilization. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, we're going to get into the stuff that went on there. It wasn't like the history of the Globe Theater or anything like that. No, it was much bloodier, because everyone knows, well, yes, the Gladiators fought at the Coliseum. I've seen that Russell Crow movie, true.

But it was much, much worse than even that, and that was pretty bad. But like you said, we'll get into it. Let's talk about the actual Coliseum and where it came from first. How about that? Yeah. So, you know, there was a long history of theaters period in the world. The Coliseum certainly was not the first, but it was one of the first, you know, built in stone, concrete amphitheaters.

And if you're confused like I was, the term amphitheater these days can just mean a, you know, a big concert venue. It doesn't necessarily mean it is just a round thing. Because most things called an amphitheater day are the kind that were not like they wouldn't have used that term back then because they weren't fully encircled. It's like it's a theater like the Hollywood Bowl or something. You've got a stage and then the seats are sort of built in a big hill and a semi-circle. Like those are called amphitheaters now, but technically amphi means around.

And so it was, these were the first theaters to be built all the way around whatever performance was going on. Yeah, totally. And like today's amphitheaters are much more like the old theaters, which are exactly what you describe. It's like if you go to amphitheaters, you can understand what a theater was in Greece and ancient Rome. And back in the day, the Roman Senate decided that having these venues as permanent structures

was decadent. So there was a ban on building permanent theaters and amphitheaters. But that doesn't mean that the ones that they built that were temporary weren't incredibly elaborate. Oh, sure. Our good friend Pliny mentions one wooden temporary theater in Rome, I believe, that had three stories of columns, 3,000 bronze statues. And they gave out free bobbleheads of Nero when you came in.

What's up with Pliny all over the place the past few years? Like if you're a historian, Chuck, especially of that era, you are so happy that that man lived because he sat down and said, you know what, I'm going to write all this down for posterity. I'm sure people who come later are going to want to know what we were doing at this time. And sure, no, because of Pliny. I guess we just done more topics. I just feel like we went, I mean, he's the new fighter flight for us.

Yeah, he really is totally. So like we said, there were stone amphitheaters. The first one ever, I believe, was in Pompeii. The very awesome and famous Pink Floyd Live at Pompeii concert was on there in front of nobody, which is a very cool, strange thing to do. And then finally, we get Nero as emperor. And he was around during the Great Fire of 64, where a lot of the wooden stuff obviously went away, including wooden amphitheaters in Rome.

And Nero was able to say, like, all right, you know, I'm going to rebuild a lot of stuff and put my stamp on Rome. But I'm not, he didn't get around to building an amphitheater before he went away. No, he didn't. And it was a big deal that the amphitheater in Rome, the temporary one was burned down because already gladiator battles had been firmly established in the popular culture. So all of a sudden, you had people who couldn't go to the local blood sport event and vent all of their frustrations and not stage an uprising against you as the emperor.

So it was something you would want to have. But because of that fire, a lot of people still to this day blame Nero for starting the fire because he rebuilt such opulent monuments to himself on the rubble of Rome. Anyway, he eventually was toppled by a coup. He died by suicide. And that left open a power vacuum that was filled within one year. I think Rome had something like three different, no, four different emperors because a little civil war started.

And the guy who emerged successfully was the first emperor of the Flavian dynasty, Vespasian. Vespasian. Very nice. Yeah. And, you know, he took a look around. He had a couple of kids, a couple of sons, notably Titus and, I guess, Domatian. I think so. Okay.

And he got them established as successors, so he was pretty firmly rooted at this point. And he was like, you know, Nero came in and tried to, well, not tried to very successfully built a lot of monuments to himself, kind of put his own stamp on Rome like Chuck will mention earlier in the podcast many years from now. And I want to put my stamp on this thing. And so I'm going to build my own sort of huge Colossus Theater. He didn't say that because we'll talk about where the name came from in a second. But his son had been out, you know, active as a military leader.

I believe it was Titus for the siege of Jerusalem, came back with a lot of war spoils. And so basically, you know, I've got all this money now besides raising taxes and claiming public land and doing, you know, basically whatever Vespasian wanted as far as building infrastructure and probably monuments to himself. Sure. And he said, now I've got these war spoils so I can build like a proper concrete permanent stone amphitheater. Yeah.

The first one in Rome and Vespasian was already pretty beloved. He was a really popular general, a successful general. He was he was popular with the Senate. So when he became emperor, everybody was like, okay, this is cool. But he really won everybody over because Nero had been taking all of Rome's money and spending it on monuments to himself and like this enormous multi acre, I think like 150 acre house called the Golden House and Vespasian did the opposite. Like yeah, he built some monuments to himself, but he also built a lot of public monuments.

And that's what the Colosseum was. It was a gift to the citizens of Rome. Like remember that cruddy wooden temporary theater? Remember how the Senate banned temporary theaters? Here is your first state of the art permanent amphitheater that you are going to watch so many people murdered and it's going to just knock your socks off. That's right. I had a very crass joke that I'm going to keep to myself.

Okay. Because this is a family show. But tell me later. I'll tell you later. All right. And he was so sort of take this in Nero that he built the Colosseum on the site where that estate was where Nero lived, Domus Aria. That's the Golden House.

That's right. That was the land on which the Golden House sat. And the lake that was built there, there was this artificial pond. So like I'm going to fill that up even and really just sort of erase Nero's legacy as much as possible. And can you tell them where the name Colosseum may have come from? Apparently, there was like a hundred something foot tall nude statue of Nero. And rather than, it was bronze and rather than melted down and reuse it, they put it

up and they propped it up in front of the Colosseum. So that was the amphitheater that had the Colossus of Nero or the Colosseum. It's like museum, but with Coloss. Right. But they didn't pronounce it Colosseum. No. They called it like the amphitheater. Yeah.

No one's a Colosseum until later. No one's ever said Colosseum except for me. Yeah. You're going to have really threw me off before we started recording. All right. I say we take a break and then we come back and talk about the building itself. Do you know that GoodRx has resources to support better mental health from educational tools to prescription savings, GoodRx is here to help along your mental health journey.

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It's evidence tampering, frankly. This is the worst kind of fraud that we always think exists and everyone says, no, it doesn't. All episodes of admissible shreds of evidence are available now. Listen on the I Heart Radio App, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, we're back. We're talking Coliseum, big theater, stadium, outdoor arena, whatever you want to call it, amphitheater, an ancient room. If you're talking about the building itself, it is 620 by 513 feet, 157 feet tall, which

about 15 stories, obviously. We mentioned it was made of mostly concrete, but that's sort of the structure that was also about 3.5 million cubic feet of stuff like wood, of course, travertine, marble stone. The reason why you mentioned the Coliseum is still largely standing through earthquakes and such 2000 plus years later is because this thing was built on wetlands, so they had to go very, very deep with this concrete, with their foundation, and that's what you get. 2000 years later, it's still going.

Yeah, there's a historian of ancient Rome named Garrett Ryan, he's got a blog called Tolled in Stone, and he said that they built facing walls 10 feet thick on each side that supported a ring of concrete foundation that they poured 100 feet wide and 40 feet deep. That's what the Coliseum is built on. I wonder what the ancient recipe for concrete was. Funny enough, I kind of looked that up because Roman concrete is very famous because it's still standing and modern concrete can crumble in a matter of decades, right? So the Romans kind of had us beat, and they figured out that it was because they mixed

quick lime in at really high temperatures, and it created this chemical reaction that was still kind of buzzing after this stuff was poured so that it would cure much more quickly and solidly. That's what they think it was. So just the heat, the heated up that quick creed? The heat, my God, the heat. If you love columns, you would be delighted with the Coliseum because there's a lot of columns, and they go in order from lowly to, I guess, the most revered as they start with

the Doric style at the bottom, move on up to the Ionic on the second level, and then finally, of course, you get to the very fancy Corinthian columns on the top, and they even had a little, not a little, a pretty sizable, retractable awning that went all the way around it. And if you've ever been to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, it sort of is like that, where there's a circle in the ceiling, in Atlanta, of course, that opens and shuts like a camera shutter would, or I guess an old film camera shutter would. So in Atlanta, it has a circle around above to where the field could possibly get rained

on. Of course, they don't open it when it's going to rain, but all the humans are covered. And that was the same deal as there was a circle in the center that always stayed open because they didn't have retractable roofs, but they did have a retractable partial awning to keep everyone else dry. And then the, so the building was huge, the actual floor, the ground that the action took place on the arena floor. It was an oval shape of 272 by 157 feet.

The sandbox? Yeah, it was covered in sand because it would soak up like blood, and they needed it because a lot of blood was spilled there. And like I said, it took eight years to build. And apparently it was finally dedicated under Emperor Titus, Vespasian son, under his watch. And he was actually a pretty short-lived emperor, although much beloved, and his little brother, Domitian, yeah. When he became emperor, he excavated that arena floor about 10, 20 feet down and built the

hypogeum, which means basement or below ground. And it was here where suddenly this thing became like this magical marvel of special effects and technical wizardry. Yeah, totally. And this is where like, you could really kick it up a notch when you could have 600 dudes and a lot of, you know, most of these were slaves, obviously. But they're down there all of a sudden with pulleys and ramps and trap doors and pulley operated elevators.

And you could do all kinds of crazy magical things down there. At the least, you've got a holding area for animals and gladiators and people. And, you know, it was sort of like you would think of any sort of backstage area of like a circus or something, except it was underground. I think that they portrayed it in gladiator if I'm not mistaken, but they would have, like there's a production company that built a replica of this for a PBS documentary a few years back and actually donated it to Italy so that it's on display in the Colosseum. But they showed how, like you would put an animal on a cage, use some pulleys to bring

it up and as it was coming up toward the floor of the arena, a trap door would open and then all of a sudden there's just a lion sitting there that wasn't there before. So I mean, imagine watching like a man fight a lion to begin with. Before it was like, here comes the lion walking and here comes the man walking in, pohom. Now it's like a lion magically appears and starts fighting with a guy. This was like the kind of stuff that they were throwing at the citizens of Rome at the time. And I can tell almost all of the citizens of Rome were eating it up.

There were some people who were like, this is an awful barbaric place at the time, but most citizens of Rome were super into it. You know, when I saw Bon Jovi in concert, I saw them a couple of times, both by accident. They opened up for 38 special when I was like in the eighth grade when they were a very small band. Did you wake up like after having been drugged in like a Bon Jovi concert? No, the second time was my senior year in high school, sort of a long story. But there was somebody at her school that couldn't find anyone to go with them.

So I went with them. But Bon Jovi in that second one, you know, when they were the headliner at the beginning of the show, there's like, you know, the band is kind of coming out and they start off the song. And I'm like, where's John? Where's John? And boom, smoke, a smoke blast happens on stage and the smoke clears and Bon Jovi is just standing there.

You know. By the boom, by the boom, by the boom, by the boom, by the boom, by the boom, by the boom, by the boom, by the boom. Exactly. He had a horizontal trap door that would instead of falling through it, it would shoot him up in an instant. And even though it's not like I was dying to get to that show, I was pretty knocked out, I gotta say.

Dude, for sure. Buddy, you'd better stand exactly where they tell you to stand on that kind of trap door platform. I would think so. Because it went up with some... I think I saw behind the scenes of it one time, even. It went up with some speed. I'll bet that was fun. Yeah

So one of the things oh, we didn't mention that that like there were plenty of people who were in that ring Including animals that would have liked to have gotten out of that ring So they prevented this by separating the seeding area from the arena floor. I rather large Stone barrier 12-foot stone barrier with a bronze fence on top of that and then on top of that they lined it with elephant tusks So yeah, yeah to get over but that seeding area was like a Snapshot of social hierarchy in Rome because they had it very much divided up socially Yeah, and this like reading this I was kind of like it's sort of exactly how it is today

You've got your very Very special people are sitting court side. Yeah down there on the hardwood floor So they can yell at Jimmy Butler or LeBron or whoever sure as senators families obviously and their guests They could bring their own folding chairs, which is pretty special at the time. I think sure But they also had their box seats, you know a little higher up what would we would call like a luxury box today? And this is where you know, you usually see the emperor and Emperor's guests just just like you would today any rich or famous person who has a luxury box and their hangers on right

Can't you imagine those senators to just like assert their individualism like bedazzled some of their seats right that they brought Sure, so after that, I had not heard of this group. Um, there there was a Social stratus stratum. Yeah in Rome called the equestrians Yeah, the equestrian order were people who had originally served in the cavalry And then went on to become extraordinarily Prosperous in wealthy business people. So they were merchants tradesmen bureaucrats sometimes artisans And the reason that they were taking up the the slack for the business world in Rome It's because the Senate was forbidden from engaging in business. They didn't want the senators tainted

Um, so all of that fell to these equestrians who made up that I guess wealthy class, but not senators or the emperor. Yeah, so they're like in the what you would call the 100 level seats You move up to the 200 level as far as modern arenas go and then you've got your middle class But within that middle class at the Coliseum it was subdivided more than 300 times For very specific areas for very specific social groups like, you know Ambassadors are in this section if you're a soldier on leave you're over here If you were a member of some sort of guild and middle-class guild then you're sitting over here And then of course you've got your 300 level nosebleeds

It's always been that way. It'll always be this way. Yeah, the cheap seats and it's I don't think it's Confirmed, but most of these were standing room only at the Coliseum Yeah, they they're just basing that on the fact that they are so steep and the the seats so shallow It's like this has to be standing room only. Yeah And there there were times where especially during Events that the emperor put on at the Coliseum where you you couldn't leave So if you're uncomfortable, yes, you had to stay there and watch because the emperor was putting this on for your benefit

Who did they ban entirely though? I thought found this interesting. Yeah, they they banned grave diggers actors and former gladiators And I look higher low for you know, what that what the reason wasn't grave diggers is pretty obvious that you know Plenty of societies around the world in different times have looked upon grave diggers as basically untouchable like society's unwanted But incredibly necessary right the way you treat incredibly necessary people Right. That's how grave diggers have been treated actors. I saw a stack exchange explanation That said that they were viewed as like lowly and untrustworthy Endangerous even maybe and then former gladiators I saw that they were worried that they might attack other people

Out of revenge or something, but the person who gave that answer doubted it Hmm. So that's worth with a grain of salt. Yeah, the actressing tracks just because it's been well established that Acting as a profession was not something that was looked kindly upon or to aspire to for most of its history Right, but but they were they were considered lowlier than slaves then because the slaves were allowed to go sit in the cheap seats The actors couldn't even come in Yeah, it's strange and I know that Rome had a much different view of their slaves than the West African slave trade that started by the Portuguese in the 15th 17th century

That was I know it's still a lot different, but that's still pretty surprising. Right, of course I'm with you. So Chuck I mentioned that you didn't have a fine to get a pottery shard That wasn't some random weird thing. I was saying earlier. That's actually what the tickets were They had that a gate a section in a seat number inscribed on a little shard of pottery. Can you believe that they're they're I mean Surely you turn these things back in right I I guess but I didn't see any any examples of any that had survived But surely there must be a couple left as many events as were held there. I can't imagine they carved You know 50 plus thousand of these for every single event that they had no, but you know, maybe so who knows

It was free to get in that's kind of cool. You didn't have to pay any money, but they were Not just anyone could get the tickets They were very much distributed in this sort of the same way the seating was very structured in a higher hierarchical way The tickets were distributed thusly as well And you know, that's how you got in you got in with your little ticket your little ticket said what gate to go in just like today To get you in as quickly as possible And like you said, they've got people out of there. It seems like pretty quickly The only reason I said was dubious because anytime they say something like very specific like 15 minutes

Right, and it was 2,000 years ago. I'm always like who was timing this back then, right? That's why I was going up to 18 minutes. Yeah, you know, I bet it was super speedy though So one of the other things about it that comes into into play later It was equipped with water fountains and flushing toilets So there was running water that could reach the the Coliseum just yeah, but then your hat for later, okay? Yeah, and that also means that during the games there were drunk dudes at urinals Barking out their sports opinions. Yeah, for sure essentially some things never change some things never change

So I guess it's finally time. We talk about what exactly went on there, right? Yeah, I mean when it first opened Titus, do you know if dad was still around to see it open at least or was he dead or was he just out of power? I don't know I don't think they really like stepped out of power much before they died those guys the embers but They said all right big grand opening. Let's get a hundred straight days of Action going every single day for a hundred days

We're gonna have a big show and a show at the Coliseum was kind of an all-day thing You know after that first hundred days, it looks like they basically had stuff during the winter And then like special events like to celebrate the Emperor or for big You know the the birthdays and not you know just anyone's birthday, but Or at the Coliseum, that's funny, but the very first thing that would happen Was a procession that was known as a solemn procession had music sort of religious themes and then they started killing animals Yeah, I saw that they kind of they kind of I guess justified or you know put some sort of veneer of Some sanctity on this by by this whole thing basically having religious themes throughout

Good for them. So yes, you're gonna make me talk about the animals, huh? Well, I mean I said they killed animals. Okay I'll go into somewhat greater detail So what they would do is they would go procure animals from all corners of the Roman Empire sub-Saharan Africa Asia They would bring in tigers Lions bears seriously They would bring in elephants they brought in Alligators rhinocerai just anything you can think of any

Massive exotic animals. It's deadly. They went and got a bunch of them and brought them back for these events Which we should say took months of planning and a lot of people working on every single one They weren't like, you know half-assed one off you know To live like a band in the park kind of thing like this was a this is like a really huge event, right? Oh, yeah, so I'm really that's why that hundred days is just like crazy impressive. Yes, it really is So they would take these animals and then they would they would convert the arena floor into something like a jungle with potted plants or Shrubs or something like that and then they would bring in either animal handlers or hunters venetories or bestiary

Who would hunt the animals in front of everybody and it wasn't like any kind of equal stuff But the animals did sometimes kill some of the humans and apparently the the spectators just love that kind of thing sure Yeah, I mean they they brought them in from all over the world is sort of like a big show of Hey, look at where we've been look at how vast we are. Yeah, we're not just bringing in local the cats of Rome What kinds of feral cats in Rome you're unsatisfying could you imagine someone getting killed by a hundred feral cats attacking them though? Oh, that'd be pretty fun. Yeah, I can I can see it now And then sometimes they would have the animals fight one another they would match up You know a cheetah versus a tiger or something like that sure or an elephant versus a rhinoceros

I saw a bear versus python Really? Yeah, dude. They got really weird and disgusting. I Wouldn't think that would even work You can't go to Python into fighting. Can you I saw it written down on the internet Chuck. Yeah, I can't remember where I saw But I think it was a legit source. Yeah, no, I'm not saying it didn't happen But did you see the Yelp review of the performance? No Python didn't do much bear was disinterested one star. Yeah, I wonder like how many of these animals just didn't fight each other

And well, and I'm sure they forced them to do whatever, you know I'm sure they prodded and goaded them and you know injured them and did whatever they had to do. Yeah But they would also just have animal tricks and stuff like that a little more circus like atmosphere at times When they weren't killing them or making them kill each other Uh-huh. So after this is done enslaved people come out and they clean up hundreds and hundreds of dead animals and I guess rake the sand around to mix the blood in and sure the guts and make sure everything was nice and tidy Sometimes they would butcher the animals and give out the meat right there

so you could be out there for a show in the early afternoon and get a A lion's thigh to keep there in the arena for the rest of the day until you can take it home and die of food poisoning Right. I thought about that too. That is not a great plan, but they sometimes they would feed them real lunch They did have vending Places like what do you call them concession stands? Yeah, where you could buy stuff and it was like a modern stadium in a lot of ways again Yeah, I mean exact like it's it so much so that I was like Oh, okay is football and all like professional sports just all descended from the Coliseum and right? How did you sneak in your weed? I

Don't think they had to sneak it in back. Yeah, probably so so After that after they got all the animals cleaned up in the sand raked and all that stuff It was about noon and noon was the time for public executions because ray they would Most people think that gladiator battles were to the death that was actually infrequent as far as gladiator battles White as we'll see but they gave them plenty of of death of humans with these public executions And they would really go to town Creating these elaborate deaths like this is a person's death But they would dress them up like Icarus and pretend they were flying close to the Sun and set them on fighter

Yeah, like that kind of stuff Yeah crucifixions Hack you to death with a sword that these reenacted reenactments are just like I'd never heard of that before my life. I mean it's bad enough to have a public execution But yeah, then to make someone reenact some big famous like story from history where the where the hero dies Yeah, or whatever. It's just like it's pretty unbelievable As far as Christians being fed to the lions go that's something that you've heard over and over throughout history

That surely happened, but it wasn't like every single time the Colosseum had a show They would just throw, you know, 15 Christians out in the middle of a bunch of lions persecution of Christians in Rome was happened over the course of a long time and a lot of places here and there But it wasn't like that was what was always happening at the Colosseum Right, but yes, they were they were persecuted and executed for their for their beliefs Like it did happen one that was documented with Saint Ignatius of Antioch and he

was martyred in 110 and He was mauled by animals like he was torn to pieces by Half-starved wild animals that were released on him and he apparently had asked friends in high places not to enter seat on his behalf And he didn't fight back by all accounts. He just stood there and took it and died And that happened a lot like there was there was a lot of Christian and Jewish persecution in Rome Because they didn't conform to the Roman mythological beliefs, right? Right. They're pantheon of gods And so they were and they were also in the minority and people on the margins have always been persecuted

maybe not fed to the lions, but Um Persecuted at least in Rome was no different. Yeah When I worked in New Jersey at the restaurant many years ago that I worked at there was a bartender named Pete and If a football game was on in the bar and you walk by and like hey, what's up with the game? He would say lines 10 Christians nothing That was like his go-to line for anybody that asked the score. Oh, well, I guess 2,000 years later. It's not too soon, right? Well, you know, he always got a chuckle out of most people. Yeah, but probably offended some people sure Looking back. I thought Pete was so old. It's funny. I was 25. I bet Pete was 32

It is though. It's so old when you're in your 20s. Everybody's still old. Everybody's so old. Oh, have you seen that? That new Nate Burgatzi special Yeah, he's talking about being like 42 and he thinks he's still young hanging out with the 20s Oh, yeah, that's 45 year old comes over. He's like beat it old man. There's a couple of young guys hanging out over here It is very good. He's but then the punchline of that. You're not gonna do the punchline. I don't remember the punchline I think I was laughing too hard. I must not have heard of the punchline. He's he's like, yeah You and young guys just hanging out when he's and then you got something like and also maybe let's sit down That's right. That was a good punch line. He's good

If you're a Nate Burgatzi fan, he was on episode of movie crush. We talked about the movie scream. Oh, that's a good good pick So go check it out. He was not a Nate Burgatzi fan. Go listen to that and go watch his specials Yeah, he has blowed up since that movie crush Appearance, that's awesome. He's doing arenas now What? It's a yes, dude. He's doing Phillips arena or state-bar marina. Wow on his next show. It's crazy and it's great Yeah, it's awesome. Couldn't happen to a better guy agreed Speaking of better guys Maybe we should take a break see work on ourselves a little bit work on our segues and then come back better guys

We're started in the streets of the Bronx in 1973 is now heard through speakers all over the world Hip-hop has truly become the most dominant genre in music in 2023 is the year we celebrate 50 years of hip-hop So it's only right that our podcast is bringing you the 50 years of hip-hop podcast series with bad five Freddy tap in to listen to some of hip-hop's most iconic name from hip-hop innovators and legends Chiboy, Grandmaster Flash and Russell Simmons originated the car cannot so that love a wish celebrate 15 years of hip-hop on the I heart podcast neck to this generation's biggest executive and more sharing stories and memory Lock only what I did because it was many DJs before me a I'm just the how we're all started as a dream 50 years ago is a reality today Exclusively from I heart podcast network hashtag I heart hip-hop 50 listen to 50 years of hip-hop podcast on the I heart podcast network I heart radio app Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast DNA testing is the gold standard for the hip-hop industry DNA testing is the gold standard of forensic science, but it wasn't always that way before that there was blood type testing in the 1970s and 80s

There was an analyst at the Virginia State Crime Lab named Mary Jane Burton with an unusual habit. She taped down clippings of evidence in her case files. Decades later, those clippings helped exonerate 13 men through DNA testing. Burton was hailed as a hero, but I've uncovered a very different story. There was a cover up. It's evidence tampering, frankly. This is the worst kind of fraud that we always think exists. Everyone says no, it doesn't. All episodes of admissible shreds of evidence are available now. Listen on the I heart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Nedra Glover Tawab, and I'm coming to you with a new podcast. You need to hear this. You probably know me from Instagram or from my New York Times bestselling books set boundaries, find peace or drama free. I'm a therapist and relationship expert. And I'm helping people like you navigate through tough relationship issues, from one person to another. From arguing from how to communicate issues with your parents, friends, partners, and more. Sometimes we do not have the tools and I love to help people. This will be a wonderful way for you to share your story with a therapist and get some real advice about what to do. You're also going to hear from some of your favorite public figures like Gabrielle Union, Gammy Norris and more because hardship is universal. So please call in tune into the show and let's get started on your journey to healing, building and growing your relationships. Listen to you need to hear this on the I heart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Alright Chuck, it's time to talk about gladiators, gladiators, gladiators. Let's do it. There's a lot of misconceptions and we talked about this in the Spartacus episode. We talked about chariot racing and gladiators and stuff like that. That's definitely worth going to listen to if you're like, wow ancient Rome is fascinating. You want to learn more about it? Go listen to our Spartacus episode. But there's a lot of misconceptions still, one of which like I mentioned is that most gladiator battles were fights to the death.

And that's just not how it was in part because of how gladiators were brought into existence. They were usually criminals, prisoners of war, not looked highly upon. That's another big misconception too that they were like today's modern MMA fighters with all these fans that are like crazy for them. Not really accurate, but that's not to say that some of them didn't make like household names of themselves and probably didn't have some fans, but it's just not a really apt analogy. But as I was saying, the reason why you didn't want to fight to the death is because it took a lot of time and effort and investment to train a prisoner of war or a criminal who had been condemned to fight like well and be a gladiator that's successful. So those gladiator schools were like we're going to rescue our gladiators. Do not let them fight to the death. We want them back. Rewind first too. Yeah, they're trying to put a good product out there because they're charging. Well, they weren't charging money, I guess, but it was entertainment. And when they're all dying, then you're just, you know, what's going to happen is all of a sudden it's, you know, the B team and the C team is out there. Right. And so yeah, they had a lot of time invested in these guys. And I say guys because it was 100% men except for when they occasionally had like, Hey, let's bring some women out here to fight is sort of a novelty act kind of thing. But the Colosseum opened in 80 AD and they organized this like everything else was organized to the T, you know, Colosseum wise, these these gladiator battles were organized because they also didn't want to throw in, you know, Russell Crow with, you know, with me, because I would get pummeled and die so quickly. It wouldn't be any fun for anybody. So yeah, they organized them by experience level by their skill, maybe by how they fought like you don't want to grappler in there with a swordsman.

Although that could be interesting. Who knows. Sure. But they wanted a swordsman against a swordsman. And then they had they had four different groups, right? Yeah, they had, well, five, they have mermillos, which were heavily armored. They had a full helmet, they had a big old shield, they had the gladiator sword that you think of. And then kind of like mermillo 2.0 were Thraxies, where they had a smaller shield and a Thrasian sword, the curved sword, but we're very similar to mermillos. That's right. Then you had the, and you were going to leave this to me, Rediarious? Nice. I guess. They had lighter armor. These guys had a net and a trident. So there was some sort of a nautical theme going on. Right.

So they could like throw a net over someone and trident them in the chest. Then you had the chariot battlers, the chariot fighters, they were the esidarius. And then finally, what do we have? The Hopolomachus. Nice job. I think these are the ones that you think of when you think of a gladiator. They had a helmet, they had a plume on it. They had a spear, they had a short sword, they had a small round shield. I think they had like the shoulder armor. Okay. Pretty sure that's what Russell Crowe would have been in gladiator. I haven't seen, I saw that once back then. I haven't seen it since then. I think I've seen it twice, but it's been a while for sure. Yeah. I think it was on TNT once when I was watching TNT.

I think, I thought it was pretty good back then. But they would, so like you said, they would, they, sometimes they would, they'd put a Hopolomachus against a Rediarius or something like that just to see what happened with one guy with a net and another guy with a spear, you know. Right, sure. So they would have them fight like that. But like you were saying, they, they did line them up according to skill level. And one thing that, that as Bear's mentioning, so that the events of the Colosseum were free. But the gladiator school still charged whoever was putting on the event or sponsoring the event for renting the gladiators. Yeah. How did the money work? If they weren't making any money, did the state just fund it all? Yes. Either, so, so holding an event at the Colosseum, free to everybody who could get a ticket, 50,000 people was a really good way of showing everybody how incredibly wealthy you were. Right.

Or if you were. Because you collected so many taxes. Pretty much. Or if you were the emperor himself, it was a way of, it was like a gift to the citizenry. It was a way to keep them like kind of sedated in line, like TV today. Yeah. It's the exact same premise as if, from the emperor's perspective. Right. But it was also a way to like generate belovedness and adoration from the populace by putting on a really good event at the Colosseum. Yeah. I'd be curious about, and we probably will never know these specifics, but coming from a world of like TV and film production, I would love to know how it literally worked as a production, like a big production like this with budgets and production managers, essentially, whatever they called them.

Yeah. I mean, they had to have people doing all that. And I'm sure there were fights over, you know, what they could afford and what they couldn't. Yeah. Like, how much money did that have? Gotta have that elephant. Exactly. We've tried it out, alligators, three days in a row. I can't get another alligator in there. We have 97 more days to go. Wow. Amazing.

So, I said that the gladiator battles have been around for a while by the time the Colosseum was built, been around for at least 300 years. They started out as part of funeral games, and everybody was like, well, we like this. So it kind of became like a thing that wasn't just part of funerals, right? Yeah. And some, I said some gladiators were, like, well-known. And there was one who might have been the most well-known of all time. His name was Flamma, the flame. And apparently he was a captured Syrian soldier. Did they call him Flamma Jamma?

I don't know. Surely somebody did. Okay. We are from now on. Yeah. So he turned down his freedom three different times. They would offer you your freedom by giving you a rude wooden sword that was symbolic of your transition back into normal society. Three times he turned it down and finally died in a battle at age 35. And it's long been considered that he was just in it for the money or the glory or the fame, but somebody, I read, suggested that he was doing it because he was trying to stand for his culture. Because the Romans viewed Syrians very lowly, very cowardly, and Flamma, the Syrian soldier, is like the greatest gladiator in all of Rome.

So they suggested that that might be why he kept fighting. So Flamma Jamma was like, I'm not taking that wooden sword. Exactly. Flamma Jamma doesn't do that. Flamma Jamma doesn't do that. That's right. There was also an emperor who got involved, a gladiator style. Commodus, who was a real piece of doo-doo, he reigned from 180 to 192 and he didn't really fight people. He would go out there to boost his own ego, apparently hundreds and hundreds of times as a quote unquote gladiator. But they would submit to him immediately or they would submit to him and he would just murder them. He had people with disabilities out there dressed up as monsters with sponges painted like rocks that supposedly throwing at him. And he would hunt them with arrows. He would come out in public with their blood smeared on him. He would kill animals.

He was just a real awful human being. There's one story where he supposedly shot 100 bears in one morning and he was terrible. Yeah. To make it even worse, he would charge the Roman treasury 25,000 pieces of silver per appearance. He said, I'm going to appear. So give me 25,000 pieces of silver. And then there's one other thing that I want to mention because the Colosseum eventually started to crumble as we'll talk about in a second. But during its heyday and possibly toward the beginning of it, their contemporary accounts of filling the Colosseum with water five or six feet deep, putting ships in there and staging mock naval battles. I'm pretty sure we talked about that in the Spartacus episode or some other episode because it's really familiar. Yeah. It may have happened. It definitely happened in an artificial lake meet outside of the Colosseum. But some of these contemporary accounts are like, no, no, we're talking about the Colosseum itself.

Yeah. You know what my bet is, is that they did it at least once in the Colosseum. And we're like, what do they call them? Namachias? Yeah. They were like, we should build our own place to do this. And they built one near the Tiber River that was exclusively for these mock naval battles. Because I think the Colosseum was probably problematic. That would be my guess. I think you're a historian now. But you can stop holding on to that fact that there was running water that could make it to the Colosseum, everybody. That's right. So I said the Colosseum started to crumble, right? Yeah. I mean, quite literally and metaphorically, you know, when the rise of the Christian church in Rome,

obviously they would come along and say this kind of brutality can't stand, the decline of the Roman Empire period. And you know, people weren't as into this stuff. It was a moment in time that it was super popular and like anything like that. It was a 400 year moment in time. Yeah. 400 year moment in time. But that would wane. And the first earthquake hit in 443, which damaged it. But it was still being used like as an amphitheater, I think, you know, into the sixth century. Right. And then the medieval period comes along. And for about 500 years, they made it into sort of like a, like a live, work, play space. Yeah, exactly. With shops, warehouses, the common area, the arena floor became a common area.

And then it got hit by an earthquake again in 1349. And the structure collapsed partially. And it ended up becoming like a strip for parts. A lot of people scavenged stone from it and other kind of works, including our works. But also they used it for like building materials too. Yeah. And they used some of this at the direction of the various popes over the years because they would take it and build Christian churches and cathedrals with this. So because so much of the Colosseum had been used to build churches and because so many Christians had been killed there, the Colosseum itself became kind of a Catholic holy place. And became an official holy place in 1749 when Pope Benedict XIV blessed it. And he said, this is now a Christian holy site. And that protected it from any more pillaging or destruction and actually led to some early restoration projects.

Yeah. So they started to get to work on it to protect it a little more. After the unification of Italy in 1870, it became, you know, a legit national monument. They, you know, of course, Mussolini comes along and fully uncovers the, how'd you pronounce that? Hypogeum? That's where I'm going. Yeah. And, you know, further rebuilt it, further stabilized it, brought out some of the, you know, restored some of the history for sure. And then, you know, I think it wasn't until like the late 20th century that it, you know, modern restoration, like really nice techniques came along to make sure that it was not only safe for tourists, but like a robust place to, you know, keep making money off of or not keep, but I guess, you know, for some of the first times making money off. Yes. Some people consider it the greatest tourist attraction of Rome. Apparently it brings in 6 million visitors a year. And I think there were 6 million people there when Yumi and I went. That's a lot of people.

It is a lot. Maybe that's why I didn't go in. It's very neat, though. We didn't make it down to the Hypogeum. I don't know if it was open yet for visitors. Yeah. No, 2021 now. We definitely weren't able to. I would like to go back and go down there. I've got to pay to go in this time. Okay. I'll cover your admission. How about that? Thank you. Well, since Chuck thanked me, everybody, that means it's time for Listener Mail. This is a good one. This is about skydiving. It's like, hey, guys, got a good story. I took my boyfriend, now husband, and his sister skydiving for his 32nd birthday about 10 years ago in New England.

I had gone once before, so the nerves were gone, but I was just full of pure excitement and adrenaline. I was in the middle of having my front tooth replaced. Do you see where this is going yet? No, not yet. And I had a flipper retainer. Do you see where this is going yet? No, not yet. Okay. Chuck, I think you went through this experience, of course. I remember the flipper retainer. I asked the staff if I should remove it, but they said no. It's pretty snug in there. You'll be fine. I was feeling vain and didn't want my toothless face in the video. And guess what happened? During the free fall, I was a little frustrated by needing to interact and entertain to the camera, and I really wanted to just enjoy the moment. So, half jokingly, I blew a kiss and flipped a bird at the cameraman, as Instacarma would have it, my fake tooth flew out.

I panicked and motioned to the gap in my mouth to the cameraman, and he just gave the thumbs up, all good. And I remember thinking, no, not all good. This just got so much more expensive, and I have no tooth. And you can even see me sort of looking around for it in mid-fall, which is... I did not see that coming. I hope that would be magically floating next to me, because I've plummled to the earth. That'd be amazing. I'd just say plummled. I think that's pummeled and plummeted at the same time. I think that's a great new word, Jesus, man. Not my smartest moment, but desperation took over.

And this is from Aaron Bogan, and Aaron sent the video, which is on YouTube, and it's very funny to watch. You can't see the tooth fly out, but you see immediately Aaron grab her mouth and motion around and sort of look around, and it's just very funny. So let me see if I can even find how you would... Skydive New England presents Colin Aaron's Skydive from nine years ago. And it's got 573 views, two of which were mine. So maybe we can make Aaron a little more famous. Thanks a lot, Aaron. That was indeed Chuck. Like Chuck said, a good email. Thank you for that. Sorry that happened, but at least you got a great story out of it.

And if you want to be like Aaron and tell us one of your great stories, we want to hear it. You can send it to us via email at stuffpodcasts.ihartradio.com. Stuff You Should Know is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts on My Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. America Loves Its Founding Fathers, but that's a tough act to follow as a founding son. I'm Bob Crawford. Join me, Patrick Warburton, and Nick Offerman as we bring the sixth president to life. Was there ever witnessed such a barefaced corruption in any country before? Let justice be done, though the heavens fall.

Listen to Founding Son. A curiosity podcast on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And things you won't hear anywhere else. My favorite part about lip service is seeing a different side of people. Make sure you check out my podcast lip service on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Hello America, Danielle Moody here. I am an unapologetic black queer woman who isn't afraid to use my voice loudly and proudly to stand up for what's right. For the last five years, it has been my mission to ring a daily alarm and make America woke.

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