Eye-Opening Gladiator Facts That Reveal the Brutal World of Ancient Rome

We think “thumbs up” meant mercy and “thumbs down” meant death — but that’s not quite right. Romans used a gesture called “pollice verso,” or “turned thumb,” but historians still debate what it looked like. The real signal may have been very different from what we imagine today.

The important part wasn’t the exact thumb motion — it was that the crowd and officials decided a fighter’s fate. Sometimes mercy was granted, sometimes not. Either way, the gesture symbolized power over life and death, making it one of the most dramatic moments of the games.