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Carnuntum to host authentic gladiator fights

Would-be gladiators are gearing up for a weekend festival in Carnuntum, Lower Austria - on the site of an ancient Roman gladiator school which was only discovered in 2011.

Published: 18 August 2014 11:21 CEST
Carnuntum to host authentic gladiator fights
A gladiator fight at Bad Deutsch Altenburg. Photo: APA/Schleinzer

Fans of Ancient Rome can explore the world of the gladiator on August 23rd and 24th, with authentic gladiator fights, training sessions in the gladiator school and numerous workshops in the Bad Deutsch-Altenburg Amphitheatre.

One of the highlights will be a performance by Marcus Junkelmann’s gladiator troupe – considered to be a leading expert in the field of Roman gladiator-related studies. Performances will begin on both days at 1pm and 4pm, accompanied by authentic Roman-era music.

Visitors will be encouraged to get involved with crafts and games – which range from painting swords and shields to making a Roman oil lamp from clay, or trying out some gladiator skills.

There will also be a music workshop in which participants can experiment with replica Roman instruments and try and create a 1,700 year old sound experience.

Normal entrance fees apply. A shuttle service will be operating between the Open Air Museum Petronell and the Amphitheatre Bad Deutsch-Altenburg every 15 minutes.

 

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TODAY IN FRANCE

France to compensate relatives of Algerian Harki fighters

France has paved the way towards paying reparations to more relatives of Algerians who sided with France in their country's independence war but were then interned in French camps.

Published: 16 May 2023 08:29 CEST
France to compensate relatives of Algerian Harki fighters

More than 200,000 Algerians fought with the French army in the war that pitted Algerian independence fighters against their French colonial masters from 1954 to 1962.

At the end of the war, the French government left the loyalist fighters known as Harkis to fend for themselves, despite earlier promises it would look after them.

Trapped in Algeria, many were massacred as the new authorities took revenge.

Thousands of others who fled to France were held in camps, often with their families, in deplorable conditions that an AFP investigation recently found led to the deaths of dozens of children, most of them babies.

READ ALSO Who are the Harkis and why are they still a sore subject in France?

French President Emmanuel Macron in 2021 asked for “forgiveness” on behalf of his country for abandoning the Harkis and their families after independence.

The following year, a law was passed to recognise the state’s responsibility for the “indignity of the hosting and living conditions on its territory”, which caused “exclusion, suffering and lasting trauma”, and recognised the right to reparations for those who had lived in 89 of the internment camps.

But following a new report, 45 new sites – including military camps, slums and shacks – were added on Monday to that list of places the Harkis and their relatives were forced to live, the government said.

Now “up to 14,000 (more) people could receive compensation after transiting through one of these structures,” it said, signalling possible reparations for both the Harkis and their descendants.

Secretary of state Patricia Miralles said the decision hoped to “make amends for a new injustice, including in regions where until now the prejudices suffered by the Harkis living there were not recognised”.

Macron has spoken out on a number of France’s unresolved colonial legacies, including nuclear testing in Polynesia, its role in the Rwandan genocide and war crimes in Algeria.

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