1/5) Pliny the Younger had little time for spectator sports or the fickle fans, obsessive in their support for their favoured colour chariot-racing team:

"I am not in the least bit interested in the chariot races. They offer nothing new, nothing you need to see more than once.. Image
2/5) "I'm amazed so many thousands of men have such a childish desire to see horses race and men drive chariots. If they were attracted by the speed of the animals or skill of the drivers I might understand, but all they care about is team uniforms - it's the colours they love!.. Image
3/5) "In fact I'm sure that if right in the middle of the race, the team colours were suddenly switched, the fans would immediately transfer their support, abandoning the driver whose name they had been shouting just a moment before! To think a cheap tunic could have such power.. Image
4/5) "This affects both the rabble and men of weight and dignity. When I think of these men and their total obsession with something so silly, so dull, so common, I just give thanks that I am not taken in by it all... Image
5/5) "..So during the last few days in Rome, which other men have wasted on these most vacant of pursuits, I have spent my time quietly and pleasantly on literary work."

(Pliny the Younger, Letters, 9.6 - written around 100 AD)
#roman #history #sport #racing #spectacles Image

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More from @OptimoPrincipi

2 Jan
1/6) It is important to remember that without modern medicine, many in the ancient world endured chronic conditions that today we could treat. Seneca suffered from asthma and described how it informed his Stoic views on mortality:

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31 Dec 20
1/7) A powerful plea to the Emperor asking for religious tolerance ..coming not from a Christian, but from a Pagan - the senator Symmachus, petitioning the Emperor in 384 AD to preserve non-Christian monuments:

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1) The tomb of Cossinia, who served as a Vestal Virgin in Rome for a remarkable 66 years during the 3rd century AD. Incredibly, the remains of Cossinia were discovered intact under the monument with a startling object placed alongside her...
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28 Nov 20
1) In the mid 2nd century AD, two brothers stood on the bank of the newly constructed Foss Dyke canal near Roman Lincoln. Bruccius and Caratius Colasunus had together invested in a fine dedication to one of the gods, perhaps in fulfillment of a vow they had once made or hoping..
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1/3) The grimy mixture of olive oil, sweat and dirt scraped from the bodies of top athletes and gladiators, a mixture known as "strigimentum", was sometimes collected by officials in charge of the gymnasia and sold to the public at huge prices..
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