Bread and Circuses (Episode)

The Trouble With Tribbles Star TrekJourney to Babel

Bread and Circuses

"Bread and Circuses" (TOS 43)

Series	Star Trek
Season	2
Episode	25
Production Number	43
Release Date	15 Mar 1968
Advertising	Amazon

Stardate 4040.7: Spock and McCoy are forced to fight in Roman-like games.

Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and Dr. McCoy visit planet 892 IV, after they discover the wreckage of the S.S. Beagle, a Federation vessel. On the surface they meet a band of primitively-dressed people who claim to be sun worshipers before their capture by a group of well-armed individuals. Kirk and crew learn that the planet is technologically on par with 20th-century Earth, though the world's civilization closely resembles that of ancient Rome, as it might have been if the Roman Empire had lasted that long. Kirk meets Captain Merik, the commander of the destroyed Beagle, and discovers that Merik betrayed his crew, instructing them to beam down so that they could die in the arena. The Beagle's captain is now known as First Citizen Merikus, and the empire's proconsul, Claudius Marcus, is using him to convince Kirk to do the same with the Enterprise crew. McCoy and Spock are sentenced to die in the arena, and Kirk's execution seems imminent. Sensing that something is wrong, Scotty cuts off the planet's electrical power, enabling Kirk to free Spock and McCoy. Merik saves the trio, giving Kirk a stolen communicator before the proconsul stabs him. Back on the Enterprise, Uhura realizes that what Kirk thought were sun worshippers were actually calling themselves the Children of the Son: that planet's counterpart of early Christians.