Salvete Omnes,
Most people here on the board know me already but esp. for the newbies who would like to know who are the people they are dealing with here I would like to present myself:
I joined this board and the SVR at the beginning of 2005, back then just interested in reading about Ancient Rome. In May of that very same year I visited a Roman festival in Germany and since then became infected with the Roman virus totally and wanted to do reenactment. Since being interested in Martial Arts in general and not being a handicraft person this left me to become a gladiatrix. I joined a group in Hamburg which is doing mainly legionaries and the gladiators were just a side-kick. Personally it didn't work out though so I founded my own gladiator group in summer 2006. Here's the link to our website:
http://www.ludus-nemesis.eu/en/index.html
Since I started with gladiatorial reenactment I read tons of books about gladiators and I think it is a very interesting topic about which many misconceptions exists, mostly triggered by Hollywood. Any questions on gladiators? I would be pleased to answer them if possible.
Please post them in the Ludi section.
Beside gladiators and their immediate surroundings I'm also interested in the daily life of the Romans, be it of that of the soldiers or ordinary people.