The earliest record of gladiators can be traced back to 264 BC. Gladiators at that time were mostly slaves and were forced to fight to death at the funeral of the famous aristocrat junius brutus Bella. Gladiators are trained professional killers. In order to please emperors and local lords, they often fought to the death. In Rome, most of the fighting competitions in the Republic period were funded by private individuals, while those in the Empire period were mainly funded by the royal family or the government.
In 73 BC, Spartacus uprising, the biggest slave uprising in the ancient history of the world, broke out.
Spartacus was a Thracian in the northeastern Balkans. When Rome invaded northern Greece, Spartacus was captured by the Romans in a war, sold as a gladiator slave, and sent to the gladiator school in Kapuya, where he was treated inhumanely. In the unbearable situation, Spartacus said to his companions, "It is better to die in the battlefield for freedom than for aristocratic pleasure." Encouraged by Spartacus, the gladiators picked up the knives and forks in the kitchen and rushed out of the cage. On the way, they happened to meet several cars carrying weapons, seized these weapons to arm themselves, and ran to Mount Vesuvius dozens of miles away to gather righteousness. Spartacus led the rebels to camp here and established a stable position.
This uprising team developed rapidly, from more than 70 gladiators to tens of thousands, and defeated the Roman army many times. However, due to differences within the uprising team, Spartacus' army was defeated, 60,000 insurgents were killed, and Spartacus was also killed in the fierce battle in the southern province of Apuria. The vigorous gladiator uprising failed.