Did The Ancient Romans Work Out?
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How did the ancient Romans work out?
Quick account of our knowledge about the state of casual fitness in ancient Rome.
Music:
Mozart - Clemency of Titus
Footage from the CZcams channels:
BroScienceLife
More Plates More Dates
VitrivianPhysique
Jeff Nippard
ATHLEAN-X™
Greg Doucette
KYRIAKOS KAPAKOULAK
TV footage:
Spartacus (2014)
Virgin Seneca complaining about Chad weightlifters is what I needed to start my morning just right
Bruh
Stoic af 🤣
took me tf out lmao
if you learn more about seneca he's actually a lot cooler than you'd think
@@chickenbootsauce8323 Seneca is great.
The part with Grizzly and Seneca was fucking great 😂😂😂
its especially funny when you realize that grizzly is greek
Greeks. Greeks never change.
I mean what better was to examplify it than a literal greek god of bloat
@@nikosnikos5082 Nope.
If Grizzly was alive 1453, it would be known as the fall of the Ottoman empire
He would have catched the cannon balls mid air and thrown them back to Mehmet and the Janissaries.
Lol he would probably couldn't defend himself with his extreme body weight and volume.
@@biyiklialperen1923 Found the mentally challenged kid who can't get a joke to save his life.
He would probably just jump while in Istanbul and the entire city will collapse due to an earthquake
@@MrAlepedroza
Yes like Rambo and Bolywood Indian movies... 😂
These boys do marches every day, in curassa, gladius, and supplies+logistic equipments strapped on them? Them bodies must be ripped af.
In training, they would have to march, fight, and run around in their training gear, which was weighted to be about twice as heavy as the actual equipment.
So yeah Roman Legionaires were beasts.
Roman legionaries were not just frontline soldiers, they were also all combat engineers. They did entrenching, fortifications, building bridges, and siege engines. And doing it mostly with muscle power and a few horses.
@@DISTurbedwaffle918 I think only the sword was twice as heavy. Doubling the weight of the full gear would have caused all kinds of knee and ankle injuries , and you don't want half of every legion recovering from that every three moths.
@@MrAlepedroza
At minimum, it was the sword and the shield.
@@MrAlepedroza It was the sword and shield that were twice to weight to improve their muscles, however their armor was the same weight
“Veni, vidi, levavi” -Benchicus Maximus
It's honestly so encouraging to know we have something in common with these boys from 2000 years ago.
We will also have the same in comon with the downfall of our civilaization soon.
@@fabiandialer1715 lol ok buzzkill. Go touch grass
@@annihilation777 this is a hard cope
@@youtubeaccount3704 ok doomer
@@annihilation777 i mean you can follow the trends they had before their collapse and compare it to today, pretty alarming
I was not expecting the Kyriakos part, had me in stitches!!
In the ancient world he is atlas
That editing with Seneca absolutely destroyed me, well played. I can't believe people were already complaining about gym breathing and moaning 2000 years ago!!
The calf raise joke... absolutely lost it
I'm glad someone appreciates it, lol
@@RomabooRamblings bro it was tasteful and put in in such a way, that I almost spit up my drink
That was a good one.
Their lifestyles were also 10x more conducive to building great physiques. No micro-plastics and copious sugar. No smartphone induced insomnia. No 8 hour desk jobs.
Sugar is the single most anabolic substance.
You have absolutely no clue what you're talking about, boomer.
There were some very strong lifters back in ancient Greco-Roman time period. Among such feats Bybon of Phola one arm pressed a 320lbs stone attached to a handle, and Milos of Croton lifted a fully grown cow which would be incredible feats of strength even by todays standards.
Oh yeah, that stone's inscription says that it's been lifted by Bybon of Phola
@@RomabooRamblings It’s actually more specific than that. The inscription reads that he lifted it overhead with one arm.
@@doublem1975x Could be an exxageration tho
@@Testimony_Of_JTF What is exaggerated? The weight of the stone has been measured. The commemoration is fairly specific. The stone was found on the ancient grounds where the Olympia was held.
There is a thing in the Basque Country (Spain) where they lift heavy boulders for a sport. There are plenty of documentaries about it on CZcams
It should be mentioned that for both Greeks and Roman’s a lean, lightly muscled body (what many call “toned”) was desirable. If you put on too much muscle you looked like you did manual labor, any self respecting aristocratic wouldn’t be caught dead with that association. I don’t know if the working class had a different ideal.
I wouldn't say that. To get "too big" naturally you need to have insanely good genetics, which is always a rarity. "Greek statue" body is basically as good as an average person can get without performance enhancing drugs.
@@RomabooRamblings
*A good an average person can get while not torturing themselves for days and feeling hungry and angry 24/7
Sadly, for most people, they're genetically destined to not dip below 12-13% body fat (when the shredded physique starts to appear with 6 pack abs) sustainably and without being pumped full of anabolics 😓
@@RexGalilae I wouldn't go as far as genetically predestined from birth. But more that over our lives, from the moment we are born to the moment we die, we are thrusted into a very sedentary life. Sit still for hours at school, then come home and do homework while sitting still, wanna relax? here's a videogame so you can sit still because we are imbeciles and didn't plan for people going outside so everything is highways and the nearest park is 20km from you. Then you become an adult, you spend 3/4 of your day sitting still doing your work and communitng.
And don't get me started on the food, your average joe doesn't eat food, they eat trash. Food is a piece of meat, some white rice or pasta and veggies. That's food, not the processed bullshit most people eat because they don't have time to cook a good meal. Think about it, for example I went to the nutricionist recently, I'm 30 yet my metabolic age is one of a 77 years old. He is 2 years older than me and he has a metabolic age of a 25 year old sure he is a bodybuilder and all, but his metabolism is fast as fuck because of all the energy he burns, mine is slow because I spent most of my day working in front of the computer and only 6 months ago I started seriously going to the gym.
I bet that if we had an active lifestyle, with little to no processed crap, getting a marble statue body wouldn't be a thing of dreams. Also if you start working out during your teens, your metabolism will be way faster, your muscles will grow at an astounding rate (the teenage years are the best for muscle development and body building because we are full of fucking hormones that promote that at least on males) and if you continue working out into your late 20s you'll probably have a natural muscular body. If you start at 25 already being chubby or skinny fat, your metabolism is already fucked up and it's way harder
I mean... in almost all cultures the blacksmiths were the Arnolds and Ronnie Colemans of each village, so yeah u could say that that bodytype was rather unique
@@MrWepx-hy6sn
No I'm actually relaying what shredded professional body builders who went down to 4-14% body fat while maintaining a strict diet, a torturous training schedule and relentless cardio have to say. They fine tuned every aspect of their biology and went through hell to claim their prize
It's just that, as research shows, every human has a range of body fat percentage within which they can live sustainably without feeling like they're eating too much or too little
Obviously, there are a few whose bodies can handle staying at 12% and being shredded with a 6-pack throughout the year while staying 100% natty but as you said, a lot of them never realise their potential due to their sedentary lifestyle, sadly.
While it's not possible for most of us to have a 6 pack all year round without pharmaceutical intervention, we're still far away from being the best we can be due to what you perfectly said
In the end, getting shredded doesn't matter. All that matters is, as Socrates said, it's a shame to for a man to grow old without seeing the strength of which his body is capable. Be the best you can sustainably be and lead a satisfied and healthy life as
*Fun fact:* Speaking of Roman fitness, the sword and sandal movies from the '60s were full of bodybuilder men playing historical characters . For example, the Romulus and Remus from the 1961 film "Duel of the Titans" (played by Steve Reeves and Gordon Scott) are so muscular that the movie looks like it was made by Hirohiko Araki. LOL
So what you're saying is that they were twinks in colorful makeup ;P
Romulus and Remus were raised drinking wolf milk and living as pastoral herdsman, they probably were yoked.
Did they poses around too when they made any kind of exclamation?
is that a JoJo Reference?
They were on steroids
2:12
Seneca while thinking about muscular men: "Those boys who spend the day exercising the body are really obnoxious...THEN HOW CAN MINE BE EVEN MORE ANNOYING THAN THEM?!"
Nero's voice: "Senecaaaaaaa! Tigellinus and I are going to burn down the city! Do you want to come and watch with us?" 😊
Seneca: *Sighs in resignation as he brings a knife to his veins*
Italian here! In Italy today Palestra is used to refer to your normal public gym not for a wrestling place. The word gymnasium has changed to ginnasio in Italian and gimnasio in Spanish. I just wanted to add a little curiosity for the languages nerds
so do you call the gym a ginnasio or palestra?
@@somedude335 palestra
As a romaboo who's struggling to keep up with conflicting fitness advice, this is exactly what I needed
It's not only influencers contradicting each other. They tend to contradict themselves too. Can't blame them when the scientific literature itself is so conflicting and imprecise.
I'm just going to chug posca mixed with burnt celery ash, have garum marinated sausages and go to gladiator school at this rate
The gladiator regiment sounds interesting. Might have to employ it every once in a while.
Always helps to mix it up here or there so your body doesn't get too relaxed in doing the same motions all the time.
I think that bigger problem with influencers is fact, that they constantly need to produce content which meeans, that they recycle all kind of bullshit just to come up with new secret recipe how to gain muscle. Once you make like 100+ videos, it is inevitable to contradict themselves.
@@miso689
But even exercise scientists and top level coaches disagree with each other.
Bro your problem isn’t conflicting fitness advice it’s your mindset. Just live heavy shit. Everyday. When it gets easy lift heavier shit. You’ll see results and won’t have to worry about what some steroid abuser is trying to sell you online. It’s so simple but people are making it so complicated because they don’t want reality to be that they have to work hard everyday to get a nice body there’s no shortcuts.
@@MrCmon113 True. That might have numerours reasons too. For example, many of studies published are just partial results, lacking bigger pictures. Many of them have questionable methods applied, very short time period etc. I think core values has been known for a long time and they will not change much in future either. That is just my opinion though.
Damn this has to be the funniest and most informative fitness video of all time
6:20 had me in tears!! beautiful dissonance of text and video and your dry delivery is just 10/10 :D
The description of Seneca's experience with weightlifters is the funniest thing I've seen lately
Fun fact: dumbbells are called "Halteres" in portuguese as well.
So my take away from this is that dedicated exercise is for nerds and urbanites, and real wo/men get swole or die by labouring in the fields.
Wanna get that body shape in summer? Work farm for the rest of the year.
Yes.
That just means you're stupid. If you achieve something to a lesser degree by doing it intentionally, you have negative intelligence.
It’s almost impossible to find a decent training lion these days.
As someone who does HEMA (Gladiatorial Training mainly) and lifting heavy circles while wondering for the rest of the day why rome had to fall I do not only appreciate your video, I love it. Specially cause you used our lord and savior, Kyriakos! Gratias, amicus. :)
Glad I found the perfect audience :D
as a guy who played basketball i did alot of the sand running lol
Seneca be like "We need a lunk alarm here!!"
This might be your best video yet and it's certainly the best thing I have watched on youtube in a long time. The part with Kyriakos and Seneca is hilarious, with his unbelievable excercises, coupled with your reading of philosopher's complaining in your dry and professional tone and the increasingly fast classical music in background. That part had me close to tears. I would never have inagined that Seneca complained about gym noises. Also the Galen talking about small ball exercises for balanced body and you showing Kyriakos with his friend again. This video is a masterpiece, incredible delivery of humor and very informative in the same time.
Thanks, I'm glad you liked it. That is a topic which is near and dear to my heart, lol
"Drinking wine is killing your gains"
- Marcus Aurelius
The word "halteres" is our word for dumbbells in Brazilian Portuguese.
One of your best works man, amazing video
The soldiers in the time of Augustus DANCED every day before anything else. Everyone in a Legion, including the officers, assembled in full kit and they did a series of "martial evolutions" to the time of a called out chant of the person who had won distinction recently.
Best video of yours yet. Awesome
“The Greeks were the main fitness influencers of the ancient world” 😂
My favorite Roman channel. Thank you!
This is the content I need
3:37- Lucian was also a renowned satirist
This is seriously the funniest video I have seen in months!
2:50
This is an image that will never leave my mind, and I'm happy for it.
The theory that Galenus held about optimal cardio training was pretty spot on.
If they made statues with extremely fit bodies, they probably had these exemples in their society. There had to be people that actually looked like that.
Greek statue physiques are actually achievable by most people with enough work. You don’t even need to lift a weight if youre good enough with calisthenics (look at a gymnast), which is definitely the type of resistance training an ancient soldier or gladiator or fitness enthusiast would have been doing. So yeah there were probably quite a few people with those physiques around.
@@seanharris8419 Depends on what statue we're talking about, but yes I agree
I like the new channel icon and the increase in quality of the videos, congrats.
Boxing and wrestling are two of the best exercises ever. Few things match the rush you get from a good grappling or sparring session. I boxed and did some BJJ as a hobby prior to the pandemic. They were the most fun workouts I've ever done, very addictive.
wrestling workouts are more physically demanding than bjj
I do some JJBA in my spare time.
4:55 Halteres is exactly the same word we still use in Portuguese.
This was a really good video. Well done
this is a pretty good video!!! somehow I was expecting more speculation but this is well done and funny
That Seneca bit was hilarious, great video sir!
Some great perspective on my own working (job) and workouts!
Very entertaining and educational, perfect!
God that bit with Kyriakos had me rolling. God tier editing,
So basically nothing has changed in 2000+ years?
nothing new under the sun
The spectacular Piazza Armerina Roman villa in Sicily has mosaics in it that show bikini clad Roman women working out with barbells,discus and other things.Proves that they had bikinis thousands of years before the mid twentieth century!
THAT WAS FASCINATING
Great video
This was both hilarious and educational 10/10 wish more people made content such as this.
Where can I buy your supplements?
Great video with some funny jokes! 😂 deserves more attention
This was great!
Gave a like for the visuals
I can't stop laughing at that Seneca quote
I hope you do a Ranking Roman Dynasties video soon. The Ranking Roman Families video was really interesting, and it doesn't seem like it would be too hard to make. You could just take the ranking system from your video about which province produced the best emperor's, and apply it to the dynasties of the empire.
I guess Flavians win statistically simply because they didn't have a chance to produce a bad emperor
The bit with Grizzly killed me bro XD
some things never change.. the fitness industry is no exception.
The bit with Grizzly in a Roman bathhouse was so absurd it had me rolling 😂 the best thing I’ve seen all week
Thanks Gelenus for acknowledging the fact that running could help slimming down our body.
Not only did you have some of the fitness OGs in here (not Greg), but you also had Grizzly. This is a FINE video, sir.
I'm not too familiar with Greg, I just know that he had some feud with Jeff from Athlean-X
Fitness ideas was various back then and the same today. Everyone has their own ideas.
The empire is temporary, gains are eternal.
Man even ancient gymnasias had better architecture compared to today…
the key thing too is they didnt have steroids
Great combination auf Renaissance music which idealized antiquity of Rome and Greece.
Naaaaaaaah this is GOLD I'm in tears amigo xD Currently destroying the sub button as we speak lmao
Do you think one Roman ever said to another, "Etiamne levo, brosius?"*
"Do you even lift, bro?"
"Leve pondus!"
- Ronnius Colemanus
I laughed at this. Grati'.
The Rock "Just a lot of chicken and rice." 😂😂😂 Tren you mean tren
Ay, my guy @Felu - Fit By Cooking had a moment of glory (0:38).
2:17
*KILLED ME*
great informational video that made me laugh too haha
Very interesting! Did Galen or Seneca realize that these people who worked out lived longer or maybe weren't as likely to die from a disease back then? I know lots of people died suddenly from illnesses or accidents so it may have been hard to make that leap.
True. Cardiovascular issues weren't a big killer in the antiquity
I am pretty sure the Greeks were also really health conscious, not just thrilled with athletic performance.
Working out does not make you live longer.
@@robthevampireslayer3211 Hundreds of thousands of cardiologists disagree.
@@Yora21 Ok mate.
CZcams suggested this to me when I was at the gym
it's time to quit the gym and understand what's it truly for.
So awesome the Romans were able to maintain ancient footage of our Bloat Lord training, he is eternal
I think I remember reading an old book about the Britons during the time there Romans invaded England, and the Britons had a game all men from fourteen up were required to do where they had a heavy ball I think it was about ten stone however heavy that is in pounds I do not know, then they would stand in groups of three and the distance between them was measured by two people sticking out an arm and holding a sword between, so two arms and a sword apart, then they would squat, rise, toss the ball to the next person, whoever quit first had to do some other excessive l exercise before nightfall, whether it was more exercises with the ball or not I do not remember.
Thought this was a toldinstone video when I saw the title
interesting, do one for their rival Persians please.
The Persians had gyms too (Zoorkhaneh house of power) where they trained with long wooden shafts called meels, is there any evidence that the Romans trained in similar ways?
Roman Army had a quite well developed exercise program and strict selection based on physical criteria
Fascinating, the french word for dumbbells is "haltères", just like the roman's halteres
Same in most romance languages I think, in Portuguese Its halteres as well.
@@Atrahasis7 that's pretty cool, in french aswell, the discipline of exercise where you lift weights is called "haltérophilie" like halterophilia if it was in english, is it similar in Portuguese?
@@jevongraham5223 Yes its Halterofilismo.
Best vidya ever
Bro I love how you keep cutting to footage of kryiakos grizzly
In portuguese we still call dumbbells as halteres lol
Hell yea we did!
Ngl the myth of Milo of Croton inspired me more than any motivational youtube video.
Galen mentions in The Natural Faculties that “we can derive nourishment from radishes, albeit not to the same extent as meat; for almost the whole of the latter is mastered by our natures; it is transformed and altered and constituted useful blood; but the radish, what is appropriate and capable of being altered is the very smallest part; almost the whole of it is surplus matter…”
So basically he thought meat was way better for the human body than vegetables, which makes sense because of the time in which he wrote his work. Caloric deficit was real af lol. Also protein shortage too, even the patricians aren’t getting their 1g/lbs of bodyweight. Oh how times have changed.
70-something year old Gaius Marius doing calisthenics in the Campus Martius to prove he's still got it.
Seneca got MOGGED into oblivion.
Interesting
4:03 no way...
yeah, I'm not sure that's real either
Maybe they did that to some very unfortunate young bulls and lions.
Can't imagine rowing a ship across a sea then jumping right out to kick every ass in sight. Exhausting!
You would think having extreme amounts of muscle would be dangerous on the battlefield because you would get your veins cut
Immediately know this guy is in the fitness side of CZcams just based off that one sentence description of Jeff and Greg 😂
What pre workout did they use?
Damn Aelius Claudius Galenus was right AF about running.
CrossFit should add circumvallation and building bridges across the Rhine.
Wow am I glad I clicked this video
Kyriakos Grizzly sounds were hilarious.
in the army, you worked and dug ditches and built walls and ramps and devices, carried loads, worked the fields ...........etc.