The opening quote; "The beasts were loosed into the arena, and among them, a beast of huge bulk and ferocious aspect. Then the slave was cast in."; comes from Aesop's fable "The Slave and the Lion".
The plot alludes to the classical tale of Androcles and the Lion, though it doesn't follow to the same outcome.
During an interview, David Greenwalt and Jim Kouf commented on the episode saying: It was a monster to shoot. - Jim Kouf And a monster to write, too. It's a gladiatorial kind of big fighting episode, and our great team in Portland, Oregon just pulled out all the stops for that one. - David Greenwalt
The poem An Ape, a Lion, a Fox and an Ass by Henry Purcell can be seen on the table in the trailer as Nick discusses Löwen with Monroe.
The words written in the arena read "Scire mori sors prima viris, sed proxima cogi," a Latin phrase by the Roman poet Lucan, which translates: "Man's first happiness is to know how to die, his second - is to be forced to die."