Were The Gladiators Vegan?
So here’s how I ended up racing down this rabbit hole. I wanted to better understand sources of protein and which ones were the most effective. So I start my research. That took me down a path of plant protein vs. animal protein.
Disclaimer: I am neither pro or anti vegan. I’m just not a vegan. In my research I came across this documentary made by James Cameron, you know the guy who did Terminator, Avatar oh and that little number with the old lady who chunked the huge diamond in the ocean at the end?
Here’s something else I learned. He had a partner on the film. The one and only Arnold whose last name I don’t even have to write and don’t want to because it’s so hard to spell. Hmm. That’s interesting I thought. Has Conan The Barbarian gone vegan? Well, it turns out he has.
So my research continued. It turns out the film these two have partnered on his called The Game Changers. Immediately I wanted to see it. Should I become vegan? No way! I’ve spent the last couple years reading books by the likes of Steven Gundry (The Plant Paradox) and others extolling the virtues of eating less animal protein and more plant based.
There are a lot of reasons for this. One thing I’ve learned is this. It is very hard to read research and books geared toward a lay audience and not find an agenda. I don’t mean to suggest everyone has some nefarious intent, but it seems there’s always an agenda. As I’ve waded further off into these waters I realize you really have to understand how to read research papers and studies to determine what’s what. For example, there is a big difference between a controlled study and an observational study.
The difference is straight forward. In the controlled study researchers control actions and behaviors such as determining what, when and how a person sleeps eats or drinks. They control the environment. In an observational study they just watch the subjects do the thing they are looking to study. The latter is the less expensive and why most studies we read are observational.
This is important because often these observational studies are commissioned by large organizations looking for data to support consumer claims for marketing. So to really get the best data we have to find out what type of study was done and if there’s an agenda.
This brings me to Game Changers. The film makes all sorts of claims about how much better plant based protein consumption is vs. animal protein. They cite all sorts of data and case studies that really support their claims.
One such claim was that Gladiators were most likely vegan. Whoa! I’ve seen Gladiator. There’s no way Maximus sustained his abilities on berries, nuts and plants. There’s just no way. Well, it turns out maybe just maybe the gladiators were vegan (sort of). If you look into the life of a gladiator you’ll first learn (just like in the movie) gladiators were slaves. They were held for entertainment. There was no virtue in feeding them and expensive diet of animal protein. Further, most gladiators probably didn’t look like Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions and loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. Who will have my vengeance, in this life or the next.
They were probably pretty fat and flabby. There have been anthropological studies of bones thought to be gladiators and they have concluded most of the gladiators did maintain a diet of mostly grains and plants. However, this is just an observation. We have no idea whether or not the gladiators would have benefited from a ribeye on occasion.
The paper examined gladiator bones that were exhumed from a gladiator burial site in Ephesus. To say the film took some liberties in claiming that gladiators were vegan is putting it mildly based on the results of this study. They concluded that it was likely that the gladiators from Ephesus ate a primarily plant based diet. Based on the amounts of nitrogen found in the samples it was also likely that they ate some animal products. Interestingly, other burial locations showed higher concentrations of nitrogen, indicating higher protein consumption. In fact, samples from Thebes shows sulphur concentrations indicating a diet rich in seafood.
Here’s a quote from Dr. Layne Norton on the film and the gladiator study
The study suggests that the gladiators ate what was most available to them, which makes sense. A good portion of the gladiator population were slaves and keeping them alive was expensive. A plant based diet was likely plentiful and cheap, whereas feeding large amounts of meat would have been much more expensive. Why was the information about the nitrogen contents of bone and seafood consumption at Thebes not mentioned in the film? There are one of two possibilities here. 1) Wilks/filmmakers did not bother to track down the actual scientific paper and just reported what they wanted or 2) they did read it and purposefully omitted that information. One is incompetence, the other is flat out misleading, which is odd considering their film is ‘fueled by the truth.’
They featured Fabian Kanz in the film, one of the authors of the paper who appears to jive with the vegan rhetoric, however after viewing the film it’s entirely likely they prodded him with questions to get him to say what they wanted and then cherry picked which statements of his they liked and agreed with. Oddly, we didn’t hear anything from his collaborator Karl Grosschmidt.
Therein lies the problem. When you look further into this film you see all sorts of conflicts of interest. From the fact Arnold is an investor in a vegan supplement company (Ladder) to the fact Cameron’s wife is a big environmental activist and also participated in the film’s production. No problem with environmentalism just maybe should be up front about it.
The whole film basically shuns any data that suggests animal protein might be beneficial and promotes with a blind eye toward flaws of any of the data for plant based protein.
So, were the gladiators vegan? We may never know. But the point is when you are doing research on what you should eat whether it’s paleo, vegan, keto or whatever, do your research. I’ve come to the conclusion a well rounded diet lacking extremes is best.
Personally, I see too much data suggesting animal protein has positive effects on our bodies to not consume it. I think animal proteins are incredibly beneficial for us. I also think if someone wants to be vegan, they should absolutely do that. However, they should (and I’m not a doctor and don’t play one on the interwebs) make sure they are supplementing their protein to ensure overall bone density and lean body mass. This is what all of us need especially in old age. YOU MUST ADD MUSCLE AS YOU AGE!
Here’s a quote from a great article combating one the a popular Harvard study on why not to eat meat.
Media sensationalism aside, the study does seem to spell trouble for proud omnivores. Unlike some similar publications we’ve seen on meat and mortality, this one says that red meat doesn’t just make you die of heart disease and cancer; it makes you die of everything. Following over 120,000 women and men from the Nurses? Health Study and the Health Professional?s Follow-up Study for 28 and 22 years respectively, researchers found that a single daily serving of unprocessed red meat was associated with a 13% increased risk of death from all causes, while a single serving of processed red meat?the equivalent of one hotdog?was associated with a 20% increased risk. (Denise Minger via Marks Daily Apple)
The bottom line is this. Do your research. I will always try to offer up as best I can good solid unbiased data in the Vitruvian Letter.
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