Salve Susanna,
Thanks for mentioning the books I'd stated in the Antikeforum:
Quote:In German (some of them had been translated into English I guess):
Marcus Junkelmann. Das Spiel mit dem Tod - So kämpften Roms Gladiatoren. Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 2000
ISBN 3-8053-2563-0
Unfortunately not translated into English yet.
Quote:Thomas Wiedemann. Kaiser und Gladiatoren - Die Macht der Spiele im antiken Rom. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2001
Although Thomas Wiedemann is German he lectures at Birmingham University (if I remember it correctly). Therefore he'd written this book in English and it was then translated into German. The English title is "Emperors and Gladiators".
Quote:Fik Meijer. Gladiatoren - Das Spiel um Leben und Tod. Artemis & Winkler, 2004
ISBN 3-7608-2303-3
The original was written in Dutch. The original title is "Gladiatoren. Volksvermaak in het Colosseum." I don't know if an English translation exists.
Quote:Eckart Köhne und Cornelia Ewigleben (Hrsg). Caesaren und Gladiatoren - Die Macht der Unterhaltung im antiken Rom (Ausstellungskatalog). Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 2000
ISBN 3-8053-2614-9
This has been translated into English as "Caesars and Gladiators"
Besides that I can recommend the book by Susanna Shadrake "The World of the Gladiator".
Thomas Wiedemann and Fik Meijer concentrate more then sociological aspects of the phenomenon of gladiatorial shows. So if you wanna find out more about their training I recommend the books by Junkelmann and Shadrake. They both assume that the training of gladiators must have been somewhat similar to that of legionaries which is described by the military historian Vegetius in his
epitoma rei militaris.
The basic training was with wooden weapons and a wicker shield against a wooden pole (palus) first, then against a sparrings partner. It is not sure if all gladiators had the same training first and then specialized after a while or if they had to train in the different categories from the very first beginning.
As you could imagine the requirement for a retiarius is a bit different than that for a secutor, his opponent. The retiarius with only very little protection needed to be swift while the secutor had to carry a lot of armor and should have been therefore a more muscular type.