by L. Livia Plauta on Thu Mar 20, 2008 2:35 am
Salvete,
Tiberius Dionysius Draco over in a presentations thread said he would be interested in my opinion on roman martial arts.
The previous anonymous poster expressed well some basinc definitions.
The ancient world couldn't have martial arts as they are commonly understood today (with belts, etc). They had boxing (with different rules and equipment than today), they had graeco-roman wrestling (I guess that's what people in this thread have been referring to), which is a fighting style with no hitting, but only grabbing, and pancration, which is a fighting style where everything is valid. Both latter styles are still practiced, at least in Italy, even though they're not particularly popular. Graeco-roman fight had its peak of popularity around the time the olympic games were re-established, but pancration was resurrected quite recently, as far as I know.
But of course all kinds of armed fighting styles were probably more or less codified. There must have been one or more traditions of weapons training. I'm not an expert on the matter, but I'll try to expose the little I know.
In Rome we know there were three contexts when people would use weapons. One was gladiators' schools, one was the army, and the third one was palestrae or the appropriate section of thermae. In these places people would not only play sports, from ball games to olympic sports, but there was also some kind of weapons training going on.
We know that because some authors satyrize women using weapons in palaestrae. In particular there was a quote about one woman hitting furiously the pole (sorry my memory is awful, for the precise source please ask real scholars like Poplicola or Piscinus).
The pole is in fact the only training implement that we can be sure was used in all three contexts.
As to the kind of training that went on in thermae and palaestrae, I've got no idea whether if was organized more like a dojo (fixed timetable, one trainer, serious commitment) or like a fitness centre (go when you feel like it, pick the trainer who happens to be there).
I'm afraid there are no sources on the matter, so this is a field for conjectures as well as the particulars of the training.
For Greece the matter is a bit clearer, because they had gymnasia, which were comprehensive schools where children got training in humanities, sports and military abilities. They worked a bit like english colleges, and they were hierarchically organized and competitive, so they probably taught something structured like the martial arts of today. All my information on this derives from the Athens archeological museum, where I've seen the plaques for the winners of inter-school rowing contests.
However, as far as I know the roman school system was nowhere as structured, so I guess one learned martial arts in the military or had to pay some trainers at the thermae.
If I wanted to recreate a "roman" martial art I would go about it by securing a place where a pole can be set up, then I would go for a light protective equipment, kind of like an hoplite's armour (wooden round shield, leather armour). The weapons would be spear and gladius. For the spear techniques I would ask some expert of the japanese bo, because I have the impression effective techniques would end ub being the same. For the gladius I would enlist the help of Viking re-enactors, since their weapons are similar. This would have to be integrated with techniques drawn from reliefs of war episodes and gladiatorial fights (the poor quality of roman swords meant that Romans usually tried not to thrust into bones, and it also seems it was common to try and grab the enemy with your shield hand, all techniques that got obsolete when swords became longer and harder).
In the end I guess I would end up with a "vanilla" crossover martial art which would probably be close enough to what a well-to-do matrona would choose to do in the thermae.
Valete,
Livia