When i decided to create something from the war of the worlds back in febuary which is currently still in progress i decided i wanted to complete some additional work which i could complete while the other project was in progress,when i'm painting figures i like to have a couple of subjects on the go so as one is drying and can then focus on the other and vice versa,the additional piece i wanted to paint was the 2x figure Andrea kit titled Thumbs Down depicting 2 gladiators in 90mm scale - Kit no S8-S03,i was given this kit last xmas as a suprise and i'm really glad i got it.
I have a big interest in roman gladiators and its always been a subject that facinates me,the type of lives these poor individuals faced was terrible and once in the arena there was no mercy shown,as i said earlier the kit is made up of 2x figures which shows the victorious gladiator (Myrmillo) standing over the defeated (Retiarius) awaiting the final decision for life or death.
The Retiarius is armed with the 'rete' a 3m diameter net edged with lead weights,this piece i found was poorly sculpted and therefore i decided not to use the kit part as it was too crude and create my own which i have not yet added to the scene.
His other weapon was the 'trident' which was the principal weapon of the retiarius,this part i found ok and decided i would use in the scene and would show the trident broken on the ground in two pieces,the second piece i have yet to add.
All painting of the figures was completed using primarily oils with games workshopinks used to depict the blood stains and flesh wounds.
The Myrmillo figures weponry is the 'scutum' or shield which could be round or rectangular in shape and the 'galdius' or short sword as his primary weapons,the myrmillo only wears one leg guard / defence which should have included some form of padding which is not shown on the figure.
Overall apart from a couple of small erors the kit is very good and i'm quite pleased with the progress so far,i would thourgly recomend the kit to anyone interested in ancient rome,i will keep you posted on this progress as well.

Many thanks for taking the time to look - Happy Painting

Hi Brian
A classic scene from paintings and from that I see an amazing painting from your hands!
I think the painting you really gave life to these two miniatures!
Very good job

Alexandros
http://alexminiatures.blogspot.com/

Looks suitably bloody and brutal.

Is there some reason why you chose the year 78 in particular for the title?

Great violence scene you have paint Brian.

Very well done. I like the metals and blood splatters particularly

Nice restrained use of blood Brian **!!!** look forward to the end result.



Cheers David

Hi! Brian.
Indeed a dramatic vignette.
The force of gladiator is very wonderful.
I congratulate completion.

Mitsutaka.

As i was addict to the serie Spartacus on TV i can only say.
You hit the nail on top with this scene.

Marc

Now that's gory. Great painting Brian. I especially like the fleshtones and metals on this one.

Agreed great work Brian

Very realistic approach.

Great scene, great idea, brilliant execution.
Now I realised, that this word has two meanings ...

hello
i like the flesh tones which are on an level i do not reach in my painting.but i think you have overdone the blood.this looks ilike they have bathed in blood.no part is not soiled nor any limb not scratched or bruised.
when one thinks that this gladiator fights where overlooked by reverees they where surely not an artless and dumb chlsahing of steel.alone the wepaons are so that they can only be used in an very thin corridor of practic usage.
your retiarius has cuts on the lower legs.if your sword fighter with his short sword would have tried to hit this regions he must bow down so he would have exposed himself to the secondary wepaon of the netfighter his dagger,while exposing the vulnearble back in his full extend.
do here normaly no wounds will delivered.and the scratches and bruises which seem to be all only light would mean that they are fight with light dandylike epees which are only creating light wounds.this is totally differenet.they did not deliver lots of light blows they waited for the hard the lethal blow and this was delivered to the upper body.and then it fast hard delivered wich did create an deep wound.bruises and scratches where more the effect of clashing to the others shield or armour.
so please be not upset but i simply find the position of wounds does not fit the fighting style of gladiators.and if you are loosing so much blood that even the sand is soiled you would not be able to fight any longer.
i never was anfolower of bruised and bloddy gladiator figures at all.because the weapons where not made to deliver light scratchings.if they did hit,then it was goodnight.
so for me simply to much hollywod in this bloody scene.without it alone from the painting it would be lovely.
should others are upset by open words feel free to swing the hammer on me.the last thing iam after is to critizise the painting which is wide about my humble possibilities.here i would critic the logic behind the execution.because wounds do appear on parts which are very unlikely to hit when one follows the classic wepaon drill of gladiators.MARCUS JUNKELMANN did write an interesting book about this matter.he writes that most fights did not last longer than 2-3 minutes.
cheers

Many thanks guy's for all your kind and constructive comments,
Alexandros
Tony
Pedro
Grant
Dave
Mitsutaka
Marc
Steve
Dimitrios
Gordy
Christos
Simon

Your kind coments are much appriciated

Harry - there was no paticular reason for the date,it was a date i found in the osprey 'warrior series' book GLADIATORS 100BC to AD200.

Markus

Thanks for taking the time to look and i appricate your coments,however having read a few book titles and seen documentries on the subject as well as visiting rome back in 1998, from the information i have gathered these clashes wer'e quite brutal affairs and although some of these clashes may have lasted no more than a few minutes they're wer'e also alot that did'nt,not all clashes wer'e defined to 2x individuals,i've read sometimes they're wer'e up to 12 slaves fighting it out in the arena fightint to the last man with some gladiators maybe fighting against totally different styles during the event.
I feel many of my fellow miniaturists will have differing views on this subject and i fully respect yours as i do the others,i fully take on board what you have said,i have only tried to portray in the scene how i've interpreted everything i've read and seen on the subject.

Many thanks to you all again,your kind coments are always most welcome to me,Happy Painting

Great paintjob, Brian! Excellent, mate!
Eddy

Thumbs Up - Rome AD78

Wooohw..…did anyone say perfect ?


Eric

Ok. I wondered if it had something to do with the last match before the end of Pompeii or the last one before the opening of the "colosseum", or something.

This is hilarious! Even the tiny corpus of coloured depictions of gladiators from Roman times refute these ridiculous assertions. [clickable thumbnails]

Retiarius wounded on lower leg (on the most well-known gladiator mosaic of all. Mosaic from N. Africa):



Secutor wounded on the back of his shoulder (he's literally pulling the retiarius' dagger out of the wound on the back of his own shoulder! Mosaic from Italy):



Secutor and retiarius simultaneously striking each other in locations that "pinsel" seems to think they never did (mosaic from Germany):



These, to me, count as sufficient proof that such events actually happened (whether they were unusual or not), therefore it's perfectly reasonable to show any of them on a figure.

And you know all this with such absolute certainty...how? The only written evidence on gladiatorial martial arts is a couple of paragraphs by Quintillian comparing gladiator swordplay to adversarial debate (and all that really only tells us for sure is that they employed feints). Cicero says that they made sure their strikes were flashy as well as practical. Vegetius says they trained with heavy practice-weapons on a stake. Ammianus says that soldiers covered themselves with their shields like mirmillones. That's it. The rest is just assumption and supposition based on looking at static images in art.


As regards the model:

I do tend to agree that, for my taste anyway, maybe the tomato ketchup has been applied a bit too liberally, but, aside from that, I could still accept this as being a vignette depicting an incident at a match "sine missione" ("without mercy"). Emperor Augustus had outlawed these but there's evidence that they returned after his reign. Certain emperors are also accused of enforcing killings in the arena.

The fight has gone on for some time. The gladiators may even have faced a series of opponents right after another, or fought in a military-style formation with standard bearers and war-trumpets playing (there's evidence for both of these practices). Either way, each has collected a variety of wounds, but none of them immediately debilitating enough to end the fight (since it's a "sine missione" fight they probably can't surrender). The two are now exhausted, both physically and emotionally. The retiarius has fallen and (despite the fact that the rules are that no mercy will be given) all his gladiatorial conditioning has failed him and he is desperately begging for his life. In the next few moments, the mirmillo will ceremoniously kill him. His cynical contempt for the broken and pathetic figure of the retiarius is such that he even asserts his dominance by putting his foot on him.

I'm not prepared to assert that in the 400 years or so that gladiatorial fighting went on in Imperial Rome absolutely nothing like this ever happened. The sequence of events I just described can confidently be reconstructed from known evidence.

I'm not going into any discussion of the one or two historical errors on the figures. The source Andrea Miniatures used reflects accurately the latest state of knowledge in the subject as it was in the late 19th century.

"smudger1960", I apologise for droning on, but your efforts deserve to be supported and encouraged. Are you planning to work on any other gladiator figures?

hello
i must admitt that these pics render me wrong.even if i would thing the one mosaic does show the man striking with his sword not pulling it out from his back.
neverless i have written that i doubt such wounds as some mosaics do show they occured.
so i have to freely admitt i have been proven wrong by facts.
thanks for those information.
i stay with my oppinion that there are to much blood for my taste but i can not longer say they are unlogic.
you never stop learning.thanks for this lession.
cheers