- Roman salute
The Roman salute is a gesture in which the arm is held out forward straight, with palm down.Fact|date=September 2008 Sometimes the arm is raised upward at an angle, sometimes it is held out parallel to the ground.Fact|date=September 2008 Despite the gesture's name, it is unclear whether the Romans used it as a form of
military courtesy ;Fact|date=September 2008 the current interpretation of a "salute" would seem to have evolved over time, more substantially in recent periods.Fact|date=September 2008History
=EarlyThe salute was supposed to have been used in the
Roman Republic , but there is no clear evidence of this.Fact|date=September 2008 Indeed it is not known whether salutes as military courtesy existed at all in Roman culture.Fact|date=September 2008 However, a number of images showing similar gestures exist from the Imperial era. These depict Roman leaders addressing their troops ("adlocutio " scenes). Usually the leader has his arm raised in a rhetorical gesture. In some images a few troops are also depicted with raised arms, possibly suggesting acclamation of the leader. Several such scenes appear onTrajan's Column [ [http://cheiron.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~trajan/images/hi/4.70.h.jpgPhotograph] and [http://cheiron.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~trajan/buildcartoon.cgi?13b "cartoon view" explanation] ofTrajan's Column , fromMcMaster University Humanities department] .The association of the gesture with Roman republican culture seems to have emerged in 18th century
France with revolutionary and anti-monarchist movements of the era.Fact|date=September 2008 Several paintings in the Neoclassical style depict Roman heroes adopting variants of the gesture. The most famous and influential of these isJacques-Louis David 's painting "The Oath of the Horatii" (1784), which illustrates a pledge of loyalty to the Roman republic.fix|link=Wikipedia:Contents|text=citation needed After theFrench Revolution of 1789, David was commissioned to depict the formation of the revolutionary government in a similar style. In the "Tennis Court Oath " (1792) the National Assembly are all depicted with their arms outstretched as they swear to create a new constitution. After the republican government was replaced by Napoleon's imperial régime, David further deployed the gesture in images of Napoleon receiving the acclamation and loyalty of his soldiers. These consciously imitated ancient Roman "ad locutio" scenes. The most important of these paintings is "The Distribution of the Eagle Standards " (1810).As the founder of the French academic school of art, David was imitated by many painters during the 19th century, who regularly depicted the straight-arm gesture in scenes of Roman imperial history.Fact|date=September 2008
From oath to salute
, when swearing legal oaths and oaths of government office, the affirmant uses the gesture of an upraised arm, bent at the elbow, palm facing outward, which bears resemblance to the Roman Salute.Fact|date=September 2008
It is unclear precisely when the oath gesture became transformed into a quasi-military salute,Fact|date=September 2008 though it appears in this role in some Davidian paintings, most famously
Jean-Léon Gérôme 's popular "Ave Caesar! Morituri te salutant" (Hail Caesar! They Who Are About to Die Salute You) of 1859. [http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/gladiators/ave.html] [http://artgallery.yale.edu/pages/collection/popups/pc_european/details27.html] . At the same time research by Augustin Thierry into the rituals of Gallic and Germanic tribes led to the claim that such gestures were associated with ancient Aryan peoples for whom monarchy was said to be defined more by charismatic prowess than simple inheritance. [According to the "Illustrated Exhibitor ", the reconstruction of such ceremonies among the Gauls and Germans was undertaken by Augustin Thierry. "Illustrated Exhibitor", 1852, vol. 1., pp.165–6] Nordic ideology, which was later embraced by the Nazis, claimed that the leading classes of ancient Greek and Roman culture had originated among Germanic peoples, who had migrated south.Fact|date=September 2008 In consequence it was argued that the gesture was Nordic in origin, expressive of the free acclamation of a leader.Fact|date=September 2008By the end of the 19th century, the gesture was recognised as a symbol of communal acclamation, appropriate as a sign of allegiance to be used in several mass movements.Fact|date=September 2008 A version was adopted as the
Olympic salute , with arms raised to the side of the body, as in "The Oath of the Horatii." The gesture was also portrayed as a salute in a number of early films about ancient Rome, such as "Ben Hur" (1907), "Nerone" (1908), "Spartaco " (1914) and "Cabiria " (1914).The Italian nationalist writer and adventurer
Gabriele D'Annunzio , who had scripted "Cabiria", appropriated the salute with a neo-Imperial meaning when he occupiedRijeka in 1919. [ [http://www.apaclassics.org/AnnualMeeting/03mtg/abstracts/Winkler.html The Roman Salute on Film] , Martin Winkler] It was later taken up by the Italian fascist party to symbolise their claim to have revitalised Italy on the model of ancient Rome.Fact|date=September 2008 In the Italian version the arm was typically raised quite high above the shoulder with the palm bent outwards, in a rhetorical manner similar to Roman imperial statuary.Fact|date=September 2008 Other fascist groups also adopted versions of the salute, including the German Nazi Party'sHitler salute , in which the arm was raised smartly to the front, at right angles to the chest with the palm turned downwards.Fact|date=September 2008 Under Fascist rule, these salutes were also in use by the general population in Germany and Italy.Achille Starace , the Italian Fascist Party secretary, pushed for measures to make the use of the Roman salute generally compulsory, denouncing hand shaking as effete and foreign.Fact|date=September 2008Because of the similarity between the Bellamy salute and the Nazi salute, President
Franklin D. Roosevelt instituted the hand-over-the-heart gesture as the salute to be rendered by civilians during thePledge of Allegiance and the national anthem in theUnited States , instead of the Bellamy salute.Fact|date=September 2008 This was done when Congress officially adopted the "Flag Code" on22 June 1942 .A similar form of an elevated right arm prevailed among certain Catholic youth organisations in
the Netherlands ,Belgium , theUnited Kingdom andGermany , e.g. the salute of the members of theGrail Movement .Fact|date=September 2008 Their using the Roman salute was however ended in the mid-1930s, as confusion far too often arose over whether their salute form in public was an act of tacit support for Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, or not.Fact|date=September 2008 Anti-clericalleft-wing publications often used 1920s and early 1930s pictures of bishops and other clergy saluting these Catholic youth movements with the Roman salute, as to imply a "Nazi" or "Fascist" orientation of these bishops and priests, or even theRoman Catholic Church in general.Fact|date=September 2008Post-war use
The association with Nazism and Fascism has been so strong that the use of the salute has been rare since the end of
World War II .Fact|date=September 2008 There are several exceptions: inPortugal ,Mexico and theRepublic of China (Taiwan ), the salute is still used during the swearing of oaths in inaugurations. Fact|date=September 2008It is also known to be used by the Tamil separatist organization, the LTTE, while saluting their leader
Velupillai Prabhakaran . [ [http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2003/07/13/fea27.html Interview with Black Tigers: Obsession with death] , Frances Bulathsinghala, reporting from Vanni, "Sunday Observer",13 July 2003 ] It is also used byHezbollah in Lebanon during the swearing of oaths. [ [http://www.martinfrost.ws/htmlfiles/july2006/hezbollah_recruits.jpgPicture of Hezbollah members giving a salute] ] In 2005, Italian footballerPaolo Di Canio created controversy by using the gesture on several occasions to salute hardcore right-wingS.S. Lazio fans. Di Canio has also expressed admiration for Mussolini. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4158591.stm Footballer's "fascist salute" row] , Mark Duff, "BBC News Online ",9 January ,2005 ] [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/12/24/wpaolo24.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/12/24/ixworld.html I'm a fascist, not a racist, says Paolo di Canio] , Ben Fenton, "Daily Telegraph ",24 December ,2005 ]The salute continued to be portrayed as a real feature of Ancient Roman culture in some historical dramas about Rome, such as the 1951 film "Quo Vadis", the 1960 film "Spartacus" and the 2000 film "Gladiator".Fact|date=September 2008 It has been used as such as recently as the 2005 TV series "Empire" and the
HBO TV series "Rome".Fact|date=September 2008Uses in fiction
The salute appears in
science fiction dramas, usually to suggest either fascist or imperial Roman characteristics in fictional cultures.Fact|date=September 2008 TheRomulan s in the original "" television series (1966–69) are depicted, as their name suggests, as a Roman-like culture.Fact|date=September 2008 They use an upraised arm, palm down salute in several episodes, such as "The Enterprise Incident".Fact|date=September 2008In the video game,
Mega Man X4 , the fictional military organization, known as the Repliforce, can be seen giving the Roman salute during the early cinematics of the game.Fact|date=September 2008In the Japanese animation series
Excel Saga the main heroines are often seen greeting their superior(s) with a Roman Salute, followed by an overly enthusiastic (if somewhat mispronounced) Nazi-era "heil".Fact|date=September 2008Footnotes
ee also
*"
Ave "
*Clenched fist
*Thumbs-up, Thumbs-down
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
