Pollice verso

The reason for the supremacy of the thumb over the other digits was debated even in ancient times. According to Fulgentius, the outstretched thumb paralleled other organs which were considered apatropaic, and like them it was seen as capable of warding off evil. ==Ancient Rome==

The exact gesture described by the phrase '''' is unclear. From historical, archaeological, and literary records it is uncertain whether the thumb was turned up, turned down, held horizontally, or concealed inside the hand to indicate positive or negative opinions. Horace writes of a gesture using both thumbs to applaud a sporting event, though his exact meaning is unclear. According to Encyclopaedia Romana, Corbeill, who gave the most extensive discussion of the topic, translates Pliny's pollices premere as "pressing of the thumbs". According to his conclusion a merciful gesture consisted of the pressing of the thumb on the index finger of a closed fist, and a negative gesture signifying death, called infesto pollice by Quintilian, consists of an "erect thumb pointing upward". The definition of in the Latin dictionary of Lewis and Short follows Corbeill's conclusion. Juvenal uses verso pollice in the Satires: Prudentius mentions the thumb gesture (converso pollice), used by a Vestal virgin who delights in the carnage: ==In popular culture==

The notion of the '' thumb signal was brought to modern popular attention by an 1872 painting by French history painter Jean-Léon Gérôme entitled Pollice Verso (usually translated into English as Thumbs Down''). It is a large canvas that depicts the Vestal Virgins signifying to a murmillo that they decree death on a fallen gladiator in the arena. The picture was purchased from Gérôme by U.S. department-store magnate Alexander Turney Stewart, who exhibited it in New York City, and it is now in the Phoenix Art Museum in Arizona. File:Pollice Verso--pamphlet--Paris--1879.jpg|thumb|upright|Title page with illustration from "Pollice Verso": To the Lovers of Truth in Classic Art, This is Most Respectfully Addressed, 1879 The painting almost immediately kicked off a controversy over the accuracy of Gerome's use of the thumbs-down gesture by spectators in the Colosseum. A 26-page pamphlet published in 1879, "Pollice Verso": To the Lovers of Truth in Classic Art, This is Most Respectfully Addressed, reprinted evidence for and against the accuracy of the painting, including a letter dated 8 December 1878 from Gérôme himself. Gérôme's painting greatly popularized the idea that thumbs up signaled life, and thumbs down signaled death, for a defeated gladiator. The gesture is used in many movies about Ancient Rome, including the 2000 film Gladiator, in which the Roman emperor Commodus uses a thumbs-up to spare the life of the film's hero, Maximus. '''' is also the title of a controversial 1904 drawing of the Crucifixion by Australian artist Norman Lindsay, depicting Christ being rejected by nude pagans. ==References==