I was checking my American Express account when I started to think about the Roman guy on all their cards. I never thought of that before, even though we should all know the background behind the use of this logo. So I started to search around and found this on google answers:

The man clad in ancient armor is no specific person. The design is referred to as the "Gladiator" only, both in the original trademark registration from 1958 where it is described simply as "a gladiator on a shield", and in the current list of American Express Trademarks and Service Marks provided on the American Express website, where it is listed just as the "Gladiator Head Design". In a 1989 lawsuit (American Express Co. v. Vibra Approved Laboratories Corp.), the logo is described as "a gladiator head design" only. So the classic American Express logo depicts only a nameless, rather generic ancient Roman gladiator. Soutces can be found by clicking the link.

link

I was also surprised by the number of new cards you have now from American Express, red, black, blue, blue ice, etc. I blame that on women, all the problems of this world are from women, STOP GLOBAL WARMING!! (use the red card)

Purgatorian Post #995