Washington Post history: how to make an otherwise interesting article sound ridiculous. [View all]

[DFW]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by Omaha Steve (a host of the The DU Lounge forum).

They had an article, inspired by some new sequel to "Gladiator," which I did not know about. They listed some real life ancient gladiators, who, in the author's opinion, deserved their own films. One was Spartucus, about whom there has indeed been a film made. Commodus, who was also emperor (and not a good one), and featured in "Gladiator," was also mentioned.

But the article started out with "The first known gladiator competition in ancient Rome occurred in 264 BCE at the funeral of Brutus (the Roman politician famous for killing Julius Caesar)."

Oh, did it really? This is like Thomas Jefferson hosting his own chat room on the internet (presumably asking for comments on whether or not he should have pushed that risky Louisiana Purchase deal). Brutus participated in the assassination of G.J. Caesar on March 15, 44 BC. His funeral was presumably two years later, when he died after trying to seize power against Caesar's son Octavian. Ergo, his funeral couldn't have been until 42 BC, or 222 years after the article's reported date of 264 BC for the first gladiator competition. The article specifies that they mean THAT Brutus, since he was part of the Caesar assassination in 44 BC.