[British Soldiers filling politically embarrassing gaps in Olympic Seating - London 2012]
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Yet not every regime in history has wanted its soldiers to enjoy the games:
"For at an exhibition of games, when he [Augustus] had given orders that
a common soldier who was sitting in the fourteen rows be put out by an attendant, the report was spread by his detractors that he had
had the man killed later and tortured as well; whereupon he all but lost his
life in a furious mob of soldiers, owing his escape to the sudden appearance of
the missing man safe and sound."*
[Suetonius, Life of Augustus, 14]
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*In the settlement following the Civil Wars, the Emperor Augustus sought to re-establish and regulate the traditional and rigid hierarchy of state. The first 14 rows of all theatres, amphitheatres and circuses were thus reserved under law for Senators and Knights only. Of course, we might also speculate that the new ruler might seek to quash all bonds of clientship between the army and the wider social elite. Better empty spaces, than soldiers mixing or being given 'corporate entertainment' from Senators and Knights!
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