Romans placed their our own status through activity, establishing a pecking order in honour, in agon - this is test, trial, ordeal, they are active. In that active form we are secluding the "stone and ice", negatives in Roman thought, which means unashamed, inactive, isolated, perhaps leisure, absence of virtus, placing dignitas into a frozen state, living in static. The contest established your being. It constructed reality. Romans where willing to suffer shame, humiliation, victory, defeat, glory, destruction, success and failure.