Archaeologists Confirmed Ancient Romans Were Using Gladiator Blood For Something You'd Never Expect

Medicine went through growing pains before becoming the empirical science of today. Some ancient treatments were effective, while many others were harmful. For instance, the Romans observed how bathing could prevent the spread of disease, so they constructed massive public works to run fresh water through their cities. However, other ancient Roman medicine was sometimes a deadly source of disease. Perhaps the strangest medicine was the consumption of gladiator blood and livers in an attempt to absorb the warrior's spiritual vigor.

According to a 2003 archeological study from the University of Cologne, it's almost certain that Roman medicine included drinking blood. Roman medicine was based on superstitions, spiritual worldviews, and the disproven miasma theory, which ascribed disease to bad odors (and led plague doctors centuries later to wear those creepy herb-filled masks). Some Roman doctors even prescribed the transfer of human feces from one person to another without any real knowledge of gut flora. Their misguided view of biology even extended to the point of cannibalism.

Between the first and sixth century A.D., many Romans believed that consuming a fallen gladiator's blood or liver could treat epilepsy and other maladies. The practice was based on the concept of a vital life force. Historical evidence suggests that the practice wasn't just a fad, and it continued even after gladiatorial battles were banned in A.D. 400. In the absence of slain gladiators laying liver-up in the sun, Roman citizens turned to publicly-executed people, especially preferring to consume the blood of the beheaded. Obviously, drinking a person's blood doesn't imbue you with the dead person's vital life force — in fact, it could actually kill you.

The Roman obsession with consuming the blood and liver of a prematurely deceased person endured nearly half a millennium, which raises the question: Was there any real medical benefit to drinking human blood? From a biomedical perspective, the answer is unequivocally no. The consumption of blood and livers primarily revolved around the belief that the practice could treat epilepsy. Because epileptic episodes typically subside after a few minutes and don't return for a few months or years, it was easy to assume that the human-blood tonic was the reason for the long remission periods between seizures.

Today, science has thoroughly disproven this through our advanced understanding of human biology. Epilepsy is a neurological disorder caused by misfirings in the brain, similar to the biochemical causes of jamais vu. Therefore, the compounds absorbed from drinking another's blood are inconsequential to the onset of seizures. And the stomach can only process so much blood. Although human blood is rich in nutrients, including iron, salts, and sugars, it's too rich for the human stomach to metabolize without overwhelming the other organs. In significant quantities, human blood is toxic to drink and can lead to a condition called hemochromatosis. 

Even today, it seems reasonable that drinking the iron-rich blood of a healthy person could at least help treat vitamin and mineral deficiencies. Yet, again, the body processes the nutrient-dense blood too efficiently, overwhelming the organs with iron and other minerals and quickly passing the low threshold for toxicity. Drinking human blood is kind of like overdosing on vitamin supplements with the added risk of contracting a blood-born disease.

Drinking human blood (or eating a gladiator's liver) is not only toxic, it's also a good way to get a blood infection. In Roman society, blood-born diseases weren't understood and were unknowingly transmitted between citizens. Diseases like hepatitis, staph, strep, herpes, and malaria commonly led many Roman citizens to an early death. These diseases were unknowingly transmitted through childbirth, sexual intercourse, and publicly-shared fluids, such as the disgusting communal bathwater in at least one Roman bathhouse.

The Romans attributed these maladies to an imbalance in the vital life force while unwittingly allowing their underlying blood diseases to propagate. Drinking blood also presented the risk of contracting bacterial infections, such as Salmonella, Borrelia recurrentis, and even the plague. Bacteria would have been present on the wounds of the fallen from the weapons used against them, and in Rome, fecal contamination was everywhere.

Still, it's unlikely that the practice of drinking blood was a significant killer, especially since the Roman people were faced with far deadlier daily threats. Today, it would be an abomination to drink the blood or eat the liver of a recently deceased person. In Rome's worldview, however, the practice served as a powerful affirmation of their beliefs in life-forces, bodily humors, and spirits. Through the lens of science, however, drinking human blood is a bad idea.