Pollice verso
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Pollice verso or verso pollice is a Latin phrase, meaning "with a turned thumb", that is used in the context of gladiatorial combat. It refers to the hand gesture used by Ancient Roman crowds to pass judgment on a defeated gladiator.
The type of gesture described by the phrase pollice verso is unclear. From the historical and literary record it is uncertain whether the thumb was turned up, turned down, held horizontally, or concealed inside the hand to indicate positive or negative opinions.[1]
Popularly, it is assumed that "thumbs down" was the signal that a defeated gladiator should be condemned to death; "thumbs up", that he should be spared.
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[edit] Classical sources
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[edit] Popular history
The notion of the pollice verso thumb signal was brought to popular attention by the painting of 1872 by French history painter Jean-Léon Gérôme. Titled "Pollice Verso" by Gérôme – and usually translated into English as "Thumbs Down" – it is a large canvas that depicts the Vestal Virgins signifying death to a fallen gladiator in the arena.
The picture was bought from Gérôme by department-store magnate Alexander Turney Stewart (1803–1876), who exhibited it in New York City, and is now in Phoenix Art Museum, Arizona.
The painting was a strong influence on the film Gladiator. The producers showed director Ridley Scott a reproduction of the painting before he read the script; "That image spoke to me of the Roman Empire in all its glory and wickedness. I knew right then and there I was hooked", commented Scott.[2]
[edit] See also
[edit] Further reading
- Anthony Corbeill - "Thumbs in Ancient Rome: pollex as Index" in Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 42 (1997) pp61-81.
- Anthony Corbeill - Nature Embodied: Gesture in Ancient Rome (Princeton University Press, 2004) 978-0-691-07494-8
- Desmond Morris - Gestures
- Edwin Post "Pollice Verso" in The American Journal of Philology, Vol. 13, No. 2 (1892), pp. 213-225 doi:10.2307/288308
