Im researching for a tattoo and cant seem to find out solidly the type of helmet worn by a centurion, specifically whether they actually wore this type:
https://www.ancientsculpturegallery.com/roman-centurion-helmet.html
As i side note as well i was interested as to what helmets gladiators would wear? Was it possible for them to wear helmets such as those worn by officers etc?
Thanks in advance!
The classic crested and peaked "Roman helmet" from your link and others is largely a fiction.
https://imgur.com/a/QkJzZ7x - a graphic from Peter Connolly's excellent Greece and Rome at War showing the evolution of Roman helmet design. I highly recommend you get the book (in English) from your library's inter-library loan system. It has a wealth of images of Roman and Greek helmets and armor.
https://m.imgur.com/a/qSussKp - a similar image.
https://m.imgur.com/a/3ngfvqI - there were also regional variations, depending on where the legionary armor was made.
Centurions generally wore a crest on their helmets in a crest holder, but few of these fragile objects have survived.
As for gladiators, they almost never wore the same armor as legionaries. Gladiator armor was highly stylised and specific to the type of gladiator.
https://imgur.com/a/y8cKyHt - note the differences in style between these two replicas, based on actual archeological finds.
Armor in Russell Crowe's Gladiator and most other popular depictions of gladiators is mostly hoey.