Quod interesset videri
potest in ludis antiquitatis: amplissimi Græci histirones fuerunt, Romani soli
spectatores. Olympiæ stadium apertus est divitiis, merito, æmulationi; et
athletæ, dexteritate atque celeritate prodentibus, adsequi potuerunt Diomeden
ac Menelaum, equosque aurigari veloce cursu… At Senator Romanus, ac etiam
civis, dignitatis consciens suæ, rubesceret ostendere aut se aut equos suos in Circo
Romano. Dabantur ludi impensa Reipublicæ, magistratuum, ac imperatorum; sed
frena dirigebantur manibus servilibus, et, si merces celebrati aurigæ
nonnumquam superabat patroni, hoc ascribendum est luxuriæ vulgi immodicisque
mercedibus indecoræ artis.
A material difference may be
observed in the games of antiquity: the most eminent of the Greeks were actors,
the Romans were merely spectators. The Olympic stadium was open to wealth,
merit, and ambition; and if the candidates could depend on their personal skill
and activity, they might pursue the footsteps of Diomede and Menelaus, and
conduct their own horses in the rapid career… But a Roman Senator, or even a
citizen, conscious of his dignity, would have blushed to expose his person or
his horses in the circus of Rome. The games were established at the expense of
the republic, the magistrates, or the emperors; but the reins were abandoned to
servile hands; and if the profits of a favourite charioteer sometimes exceeded
those of an advocate, they must be considered as the effects of popular
extravagance, and the high wages of a disgraceful profession.
—Edward Gibbon, De Lapsu et Ruina Imperii Romanorum (The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire)
