Swords, sandals and ... sharks? Critics sharpen their spears over Gladiator II inaccuracies
Ridley Scott’s Gladiator II has not been released yet, but historians are lining up to point out “fantastical” inaccuracies in what is expected to be one of the biggest box-office hits of the year.
The three minute-long trailer, released in July, shows a mace-wielding gladiator astride an African rhino, complete with stirrups, bridle and saddle, charging down the film’s hero Lucius, played by Paul Mescal.
Another excerpt shows the Colosseum flooded with water to stage a naval battle, known as a Naumachia.
Around half a dozen sharks can be seen swimming around a pair of warring ships and several fake islands.
While naval battles in the Colosseum were recorded under the reigns of emperors Titus and Domitian, the notion of shark-infested waters at games in the ancient Roman capital was not.
Dan Snow, the broadcaster and historian, said there was no evidence to support the idea of sharks being used in amphitheatres and questioned how they could be kept alive during transportation.
He added it was also likely the ships would have been manned by condemned criminals rather than valuable gladiators.
“Gladiators we now think were more the equivalent of very highly paid [sports] stars, either premiership footballers or UFC fighters,” he told The Telegraph:
Dr Shadi Bartsch, a classicist from the University of Chicago, offered a more forthright opinion.
“[It’s] total Hollywood bull----. I don’t think Romans knew what a shark was,” she told the Hollywood Reporter, an American news and entertainment magazine.
Snow, whose two-part documentary series about the Colosseum is due to be released next week, added that rhinos would never have been used for mounted combat in the arena as they would have been just as likely to attack their handlers as their intended victim.
“Rhinos are famously grumpy animals. You can’t domesticate them… they despise their own keeper, they’re particularly horrible animals,” he said.
While inaccurate, he said: “I think artists, film-makers and writers should always be allowed to project fantastical visions of the past.”
Another scene in the film, already seen by The Telegraph, shows a group of Roman diners passing around a plate of powdered rhino horn during a lavish banquet.
However, historians say there is no evidence to suggest powdered rhino horn was ever used as a medicine, or for recreational purposes in the Roman Empire. Its earliest use as a medicine dates back to China in the 16th century.
Scott’s original 2000 Gladiator film, starring Russell Crowe, also previously came under fire for stretching the truth of history.
Critics singled out the use of fireballs, catapults and ballistae by the Roman army in the opening battle scene against a tribe of Germanic barbarians as well as the choice of armour of its legionnaires.
Historians said it is unlikely these siege weapons would have been used in an open field.
Historians also previously raised their eyebrows at Scott’s 2023 biopic Napoleon, which depicted scenes in which the French army fired cannonballs on the Pyramids of Egypt.
Prof Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, a Roman social and cultural historian from the University of Cambridge, described the Colosseum scenes in Gladiator II as “gloriously outrageous” and “most unlikely to be historical”, although said similar incidents were alleged in Roman biographies of the tyrannical emperors Elagabalus and Commodus.
Tom Holland, the historian and co-presenter of the Rest is History Podcast, argued that while such scenes may be technically inaccurate, the sense of spectacle they provide gives a more authentic portrayal of the Colosseum than a documentary ever could.
Scott, who has little truck for historical pedantry, has defended his depiction of sharks in the Colosseum, arguing the technological ingenuity of the Romans meant they easily could have made this reality.
When questioned last week about the historical accuracy of the scene in an interview with Collider, a news entertainment website, 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------ water. Are you joking? And to get a couple of sharks in a net from the sea, are you kidding? Of course, they can.”
Gladiator II will be released on Nov 15.