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Gladiators And Blood Sports In Ancient Rome

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Gladiators And Blood Sports In Ancient Rome
Blood sports refer to sporting activities that end in bloodshed. This is through injuring and killing of both the human and animal participants in order to please the spectators of the sport, honour and remember the dead, and also to punish law breakers. According to David .S. Potter in Gladiators and Blood sports in ancient Rome, gladiatorial combat and beast hunting were commonplace activities that occurred under the permission and supervision of the ruling emperors and they took place in arenas with public viewing.
Blood sports in ancient Rome served several purposes that would ultimately lead to the reinforcement or undermining of social orders. First, participants in these sports viewed them as professional careers (Potter, pg. 75).

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