Venator
A venator, Latin for a hunter, was a trained participant in Roman animal hunts, or venationes. Performances could include close combat, the use of a spear and killing an animal. The claim that a venator only performed tricks while a bestiarius fought is therefore incorrect.
Hunts, animal displays, training and executions by animals were different elements of the programme. A venator was not a gladiator in the narrow sense of a fighter against another person. Hunts nevertheless formed part of the same public spectacles, and the terminology for participants was not always uniform.
Performances and skills
In Moral Letters to Lucilius 85.41, Seneca gives examples of training dangerous animals. His discussion of skill and control is not a definition of the venator’s profession. Trick performances existed alongside hunts, but do not demonstrate that actual fighting was absent.
Social and Cultural Context
Hunting images must be read in their compositional context: hunters, assistants, trainers and condemned people need to be distinguished. An unlabelled figure does not always permit a confident occupational designation. Equipment and the positioning of participants in mosaics and reliefs complement written sources without supplying a single unchanging standard for the whole empire.
Image of a venator with a lion. Amphitheater "Emerita Augusta". National Museum of Roman Art,Merida. Late 1st century AD
Terracotta bas-relief with a venator or bestiary. The British Museum. 1-2 century ADRelated topics
Literature and sources
- Seneca. Moral Letters to Lucilius, 85.41.
- Arena animal hunts: Metropolitan Museum of Art
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