News of the week: Bears linebacker Lance Briggs wrecked his $350,000 car.
What the professor says: The Romans wouldn’t be surprised to find Briggs tooling around in a Lamborghini. Good athletes — even those lacking great navigational skills — had serious money.
“Serious” meant an income 10 to 100 times that of the average person. Briggs would be near the top of this scale so he’d likely have a country villa and a big house in town.
He would need lots of slaves to keep the houses running and help with travel, as well as bodyguards. Consider it your ancient entourage.
Briggs would burn lots of incense. The gods smelled nice, and successful athletes thought they were good company for the gods.
On long trips, sports stars of Briggs’ caliber rode in comfy wagons. Note that one sign of success was that you didn’t drive yourself!
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