Let’s define “children” in this instance as “people too young to be allowed to fight in the military according to the practices of the time.”
And my question is, did the Romans ever put children into the arena to fight to the death? If so, how often, and how was it regarded by Roman society at large?
Are we counting only professional fights, or do convicts count? Because in the second case yes, although I understand most of them didn’t fight much.
I meant (though I know this wasn’t clear) any case, officially sanctioned, of putting someone in the arena to fight to the death in front of an audience.
BTW I’m asking about this because I’ve had a hard time figuring out why the premise of the book The Hunger Games strikes me as so unbelievable. I’m not naive enough to think that people can’t be entertained by combat to the death, but the idea of the story has nevertheless always struck me as completely implausible. This morning I realized it may be because the ones being made to fight are often children–female children at that. I do find that I’d be suprised if any culture ever had a public celebration of mortal combat between children like that.
Yes, that’s a weak point. A 12yo will likely not be much of a contestant.
Perhaps not in a Hunger Games like scenario, but in a pack children could be just as deadly as adults.
I’m not aware of laws at the time protecting slaves in any way, and there were certainly child slaves. So I would guess that it would be a essentially a marketing decision – they would do it if it was popular enough.
Yeah, that makes sense. Basically what I’m asking is, was it popular enough?
I read the first few posts in this thread and felt sick to my stomach for a couple of seconds. The idea of youngsters fighting each other to the death for amusement of others is beyond my ken. That so many young readers are able to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy this kind of thing makes me shudder.
Looking at recorded history, there is this bit from one of the most hated emperors (as if we needed even more reasons to hate him)
I would think it was not common, but seeing as slaves and conquered people were expendable, it is likely that Romans would had some gruesome “divisions” to their entertainment, that is: women against women and then…
From about the early empire on a slave could attempt to get relief from mistreatment and at various times it was illegal to kill a slave absent cause. Indeed a find at a Roman fort in the UK of a Childs body in 2010 is generally considered to be that of a slave of a soldier accidentally killed by her master and then buried hurrily.
In my misbegotten childhood spent indoctrinated by fundamentalist Christian associates, I distinctly remember that I was taught that Romans fed Christian children to the wild animals.
I don’t know if that is true (google-fu is failing me - Cecil talks about how it happened with adults) or if it counts in the OP’s constraints (even if it happened, there’s not much expectation that the kids are going to be effectively doing much against animals after all) but it might be worth looking into.
That said, the Romans were pretty damn depraved by our current standards. Their idea of “boring lunch intermission” was watching people be tortured to death or mauled by animals. I can easily see a culture moving from that on to “those children of people (who aren’t US so really aren’t people in the first place) would be totally amusing to watch fight against themselves.”
I have to believe that if they had enough captured children brought in regularly enough (assuming also an excess of slave labor or lack of interest in owning slaves) that having entire rafts of kids fighting to the death like in Battle Royale or Hunger Games would be pretty ok to them.
Well, criminals. It was pretty much only criminals who were publicly tortured to death and mauled by animals, and the attitude was “Well, that’s what you get for being a criminal.”
But with rare exceptions (like Nero’s celebration for the King of Armenia), I don’t think children fighting happened all that often. At least, I’ve never read about it being common. I mean, occasionally, joke matches were staged…Domitian liked to have women fight dwarfs, but gladiator matches were serious business, almost religious rituals, and were usually between trained men.
Remember that ‘soldiers’ could be pretty young then. Even later. There were quite a few 10- and 11-year-old’s in the US Civil War troops, or in the British Navy of that era.
They really weren’t “soldiers” as many would look at it. The US Civil war used young boys for drummers, etc, they generally didn’t carry a gun.
Ancient Rome spanned several centuries, but for the Republican period at least, membership in the Legions was restricted to property owners between the ages of 16 and 46.
I doubt it was common for children to be combat soldiers or sailors in any military of any era. As DrDeth pointed out, youngsters, if allowed to serve at all, would be assigned to non-combat roles. Exceptions to this were probably few and far between, and made only out of dire necessity (such as by Nazi Germany at the very end of the war, or by today’s impoverished guerrilla armies and militias in the Third World).
No, as t-bonham@scc.net says above, young boys were definitely combat troops in the navies of the Napoleonic era. Not just the Royal Navy, all of the European navies of the era, and as far as I’m aware in the brand-new US Navy too.
Midshipmen were typically 11-13 years old when they joined combat ships, and they were definitely combatants. Lord Nelson, for instance, was 12 when he joined the Royal Navy as a Midshipman.
There were plenty of boys in the non-commissioned ranks, too, starting around the same ages. Powder monkeys were almost always young boys.
Yes, but that was mainly as non-combatant as you could get in a fighting ship. They didn’t hit, kill, main or shoot anyone, they just did the odd jobs required to run a ship or fetch gunpowder, etc. Of course, their odds of dying were about the same as anyone else, but they were not expected to display the bloodythirsty savagery of hand-to-hand or firearms combat. (Probably mainly because dadults would do that job better).
Midshipman, IIRC, was an apprentice officer (and plum position for moving up the ladder). In that environment, they started early to learn the ropes (literally, too.)
Junior Midshipmen did take part in the fighting, as did powder monkeys, cabin boys, and all other crew members. They did not act, and they were not treated by the enemy, as non-combatants. They fought, including in hand-to-hand raiding parties, they were wounded and killed, and they were treated as POWs when captured, just like the adult crew members.
Find me one cite of them being treated as non-combatants during the Napoleonic Wars period.
So were they typically added to raiding parties and boarding parties, or were they just expected to defend themselves and the ship when they were boarded and things were desperate? In all the “Midshipman Whatever” stories I read, I don’t specifically recall them being issued pistols or swords, or getting hand-to-hand combat training… Although at some point that must have happened.
I assume you’re referring to The Hunger Games trilogy. I think you’re missing the point. The entire series focuses on how evil the games are. It’s not held up as something to celebrate or aspire to.