Lamp showing a man with a horse

Circus games in Rome were like cricket in India. Every class – from the emperor to the poorest – came to these spectacles, in arenas like the Colosseum. Cheap mass-produced oil lamps take us into the homes of ordinary Romans. They show the popularity of gladiators and horse races. Fights between exotic wild animals brought from all over the known world proclaimed Rome’s enormous power. Emperors used ‘bread and circuses’ to keep the people content.