Yahoo Movies Gladiator 2's flooded Colosseum scene is causing a big historical debate
Gladiator 2 was always going to present questions about historical accuracy, but these debates are more fun when they're about massive sharks.
Ridley Scott is no stranger to a debate about historical accuracy. In fact, it seems like he relishes the fight. With his latest period epic, Gladiator 2, he's at the centre of another historical sticking point — this time based around a flooded Colosseum... and sharks.
When Scott released Napoleon into cinemas last year, he had stark words for those prepared to criticise the film over its period accuracy — including a controversial scene in which Napoleon fired cannons at the pyramids. He told The Times: "When I have issues with historians, I ask: ‘Excuse me, mate, were you there?' No? Well, shut the f*** up then."
The same questions are arising around a scene glimpsed in the trailers for Gladiator 2, in which Paul Mescal's lead character takes part in a naval battle within the bizarre confines of a Colosseum filled with water. During that battle, numerous sharks are released into the arena.
How much of this is plausible? Well, the central conceit of a flooded arena is a very real one as part of a Roman pursuit known as "naumachia". A naumachia was a staged naval battle, constructed either in a body of water — natural or man-made — or in a building. Julius Caesar staged the first known naumachia in 46 BC, using a basin dug near the Tiber river.
During Nero's reign a century later, the first known naumachia in a wooden amphitheatre took place. It is known that the Colosseum itself was also used for naumachiae, though its dimensions meant that any naumachia performed there would be less grand than one in a purpose-built body of water.
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Nobody disagrees about the presence of water in the Colosseum. However, the sharks are a bit of a sticking point. Roman expert and classicist Dr Shadi Bartsch of the University of Chicago told The Hollywood Reporter that the presence of sharks is "total Hollywood bull***t", adding: "I don’t think Romans knew what a shark was."
Scott, naturally, has mounted a full-throated defence of his movie. When a Collider interviewer noted that "the sharks were not there in real life", Scott took issue with it. He said: "You're dead wrong. The Colosseum did flood with water, and there were sea battles ... Dude, if you can build a Colosseum, you can flood it with f***ing water. Are you joking? And to get a couple of sharks in a net from the sea, are you kidding? Of course they can."
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This sounds like Scott's usual dismissiveness, but he's actually right. In the 77 AD book Natural History by Roman philosopher Pliny the Elder (via Hakai Magazine), he wrote of divers having "fierce encounters with sharks" — specifically dogfish. He added: "The only safe course is to turn on the sharks and frighten them. For sharks fear men just as much as men fear them."
Gladiator 2 is seemingly set in around the 3rd century AD — based on the presence of sibling emperors Caracalla and Geta — over 100 years after Pliny wrote of Romans interacting with sharks. Scott suggests that the sharks in Gladiator 2 are "only about six or seven feet", which is fairly close to the five feet of length reached by the largest dogfish species.
So it seems as if, on this occasion at least, history is partially on Scott's side. Of course, it isn't hugely important that historical dramas completely reflect the real world, but it's nice that there's enough information to suggest that, in this case, there might really have been sharks in the Colosseum at some point.
Were they taking bites out of unfortunate gladiators? Probably not. But we have to let Hollywood have a little bit of fun, don't we? I think we're gonna need a bigger arena.
Gladiator 2 is in UK cinemas from 15 November.
