ANCIENT GREEK ATHLETICS.pdf.pdf

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T. FALCOS
GREECE AND ATHLETICS
INTRODUCTION
At the root of athletics there is the inclination to satisfy the “instinct” of
movement, which combines the disposition with the urge for victory (when that same
“instinct” is combined with some kind of rhythmical and harmonic disposition, it results
in dance). If the formulation is true, then, of course, it will be vain to seek a moment
when this basic element of civilization first presented itself. We may probably say
without fear of contradiction that the principles of athletics are lost in time, that it
concerns a human phenomenon as universal as music and dancing, law and religion.
At the beginning athletics was certainly simple, without many rules, but it was still able
to shine and flourish and prosper, though at other times it could degenerate into a
marginal phenomenon, which was nevertheless strong enough to revive, given
encouragement. At the beginning of western civilization it enjoyed a great flowering
which lasted until the 4th
century AD. For many centuries, under pressure from the
Christian religion, it just managed to survive in the Byzantine hippodromes and
jousting tournaments. In the 20th
century, which rediscovered the human body and the
importance of physical training, athletics prospered somewhat, though not of course to
the extent it did so in ancient times, for inherent reasons.
Sport belongs to the area of the perceptible. It is characterized first of all by
movement and then by movement of bodies. The perceptible, the body and its
movement, its relation with the soul and the conceivable, are the facts which will
concern us. There is an indisputable connection between the body and the soul, and
that is so whether you take the view that the spirit is the most perfect product of matter
or whether you adopt the concept that it has to do with substances which are
ontologically different, which enter a temporary relationship and dependence. The
spirit and the perceptible are not areas which are hostile and irreconcilable. The body
is no longer considered a “prison” and a “grave” of the soul, as in early idealism.
Prompted by sport, non-materialistic philosophers can make the most of the noble
Platonic principle: neither the soul moves without the body, nor the body without the
soul, in combination with the superb adage of the Apostle Paul that the body is the
temple of the Holy Spirit.
Another useful aspect the aims of sport. Athletics can aim at entertainment,
victory, the preparation of fighting troops, health, and beauty. The attitude of a nation
and of separate teams or individuals towards athletics depends on how they value the
tangible, movement, glory, war and games, strength, beauty and health. So there are
many fields of research open.
People who are interested in the enormous problem of values, origin,
formation, translocation and in the ways they are gradually overcome will find special
interest in the study of the phenomenon of athletics and competition. The athletic spirit
was influenced by the values of a specific society, but in its turn influenced them. If, for
instance, the gods were interested in earthly life, if they helped mortals, if they
embraced and assisted human life in every way, if they were not indifferent or
exclusive in their pride, if they were sports-lovers imbued with the spirit of competition
and if they possessed exquisite beauty, this is obviously due to the fact that their
creators considered human and earthly life as the most important value, that they
themselves were imbued by the spirit of athletics and that they held perceptible beauty
in high esteem.

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The ideal of kalokagathia (beauty and virtue) which for many centuries was
dominant in Greece owes a very great deal to athletics. I would say that it cannot be
conceived without the life at the gymnasia and the wrestling-schools, where people
passed a part of their life and discussed not only athletics, but other topics as well,
from the most facetious to the most serious. This is where the first part of the ideal was
formed, that of bodily beauty. Bodies which took part in athletics developed the regular
and symmetrical proportions which are regarded as the fundamental element of bodily
perfection. In this area they noticed that the people who moved only their bodies and
neglected ethical and spiritual completion became vulgar and crude. Therefore the
ideal of beauty was combined with the older ideal of kindness (arete), which originally
simply meant supremacy in any field, though it later acquired an ethical nuance. The
ideal of kindness is not, therefore, a creation of a theorist or of a school. It was the
creation of a whole nation in the gymnasia and the wrestling-schools. I believe that the
role of the old theorists is restricted to the theoretical validation and promotion of this
ideal.
Sport is an essential expression of human civilization, analogous to craft,
science, the fine arts, law, ethics, religion or philosophy. It includes material objects,
systems of knowledge and also ethical and spiritual values. It directly influences
almost all other expressions of culture and is, of course, influenced by them. In that
way it influences and is influenced by religion. At base, religion and athletics are
different things. But since the time when the clergy accepted athletics and undertook
the organization of basic athletic events in Greece, religion has been influenced by
sport, and, of course, vice versa. The oldest influence on religion is the fact that the
gods were regarded as sports-lovers and athletes. With the marriage of athletics with
religion, the gods became patrons and masters of the events; they were considered
willing spectators, if not fanatical supporters. For its part, athletics, under the protection
of religion, received some of the sanctity which distinguishes religion.
Athletics was influenced also by the progress of specialist skills. One of the
most important contests was the chariot race. This event required knowledge and
systems of knowledge concerning horses, training, improvement of the breed etc. But
these contributions also required the making of a chariot which was light, but strong,
flexible and stable. We must assume that the knowledge of special skills also improved
to meet the needs in this area.
How deep an influence athletics exercised on the art of the ancients, is obvious
to the student of art. The artists learnt to depict the human body by frequenting the
wrestling-schools and gymnasia. The workshops of Argus and Sikyon specialized in
the depiction of athletes. Up until the end of the 5th
century BC, with few exceptions,
only athletes had the right to erect statues. Painting and vessel-painting derived
themes and knowledge from athletics. Anyone interested in penetrating into the plastic
arts must be acquainted in depth with the phenomenon of athletics.
For people in ancient times, athletics was not mainly entertainment, but an
action which they experienced daily. Almost all young people concerned themselves
with athletics and the men frequented the gymnasia and the wrestling schools. People
who go to the same places and who have roughly the same experiences, form
opinions about behaviour and ethics which are different from those who are ignorant of
that environment. So, since the Greeks met their fellow-men more frequently in the
market and the wrestling schools, we may confidently assume that ancient mores were
formed and developed substantially in these areas. Nakedness, for instance, which
became the norm towards the end of the 8th
century, certainly contributed to a different
notion of nudity. Spectators became accustomed to seeing the practical benefit of
nakedness and to observing the beauty of the body, a thing which had immense
repercussions on the development of art. Nudity ceased to be regarded as something
ugly and obscene. It is true that the wrestling schools and the gymnasia in a sense
favored homosexuality, so that in the end the state was forced to intervene and to
institute stricter rules. Therefore mores were influenced by athletics.

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Interest in sport presupposes a belief in the potential improvement of the
human being. People who believe they cannot improve have no reason to exercise.
Physical exercise promotes joy of life, the acceptance of the body and of the material
world and favours the cultivation of social instincts. It promotes the acceptance of
difficulties and pain with resignation and counteracts pessimism. It is impossible for the
ascetic mentality, which regards the physical existence of mankind with suspicion and
hatred and considers happiness a diabolical pursuit, to prosper within the ambience of
sports. Antisocial ideas of retreat from the world or of the arrogant isolation of the
individual and any closing in onto himself are also unacceptable. All of this can be
easily recognized in some essential characteristics of the Ancient Greek philosophy. It
is true, of course, that philosophers are powerful and independent individuals who at
times oppose the fundamental ideas of their times. However, the role which athletics
played in the forming of the constituent parts of Greek philosophy is indisputable. But
philosophy, too, and in a direct way, adopted and shaped the values of athletics for its
own needs, expressed them theoretically, clarified them and promoted them. Socrates,
Plato and Aristotle are constantly and directly interested in athletics.
Medicine also learned much from gymnastics. Doctors learnt a great deal from
the trainers of those athletes who suffered from health problems. By reason of what
they learnt and by using their theoretical and practical knowledge they formed their
own theories on athletics. Naturally, they emphasized the facet of exercise which
emphasized its role in maintaining health and curing illnesses.
So people who are interested in civilization have before them abundant
material on which to meditate, compare and form conclusions. If they study athletics
carefully, they will understand more profoundly the heroic character of Greek
civilization and its dominant philosophy, its love for life and the tangible, its acceptance
of happiness, acceptance with resignation of the difficulties of life and so on. They will
be able to classify culture, or the different stages of a culture, according to its genuine
interest in athletics. A culture that is characterized by profound, everyday interest in
sport and games, where there is active participation by the masses and where physical
training is supported by the state, is different from one that regards sport as a
spectacle designed for the entertainment and amusement of the crowds, where skilled
athletes engage in public display. Lastly, people whose culture is indifferent to athletics
or who look on sport with distrust and distaste have their own, very different ideas. But
the culture of such, or any other, nation can pass through different stages. Greek
civilization, if we acknowledge the continuum, passed through the stages mentioned
by gradual but steady mutation.
It has been claimed that sport was a characteristically Greek phenomenon and
that Greek civilization should be named “competitive”. Other researchers, relying on
comparative studies, showed that all the categories of Greek games are found in other
cultures as well, so athletics is not an exclusively Greek phenomenon. In this way a
great deal of confusion has grown up around this issue. The Ancient Greeks were
quite clear on this: they knew the situation, which was that they had sporting events,
as did other nations. And if they were in any doubt, they had but to read Herodotus.
The philosophers were more familiar with the matter. When Plato finds the origin of
dancing and gymnastics in the inborn disposition of children for leaping and skipping,
he obviously does not mean that only Greek children leapt and skipped… If we
conjecture as to whether or not athletics is a characteristic Greek phenomenon, we are
not approaching the issue properly. A researcher who wishes to reach theoretical
conclusions must not speculate in this way. He or she must consider athletics as a
universal human phenomenon, and from there investigate the extent and the quality
and the importance of the phenomenon in the specific culture under study, and must,
above all, seek and prove the connection and the interactions with other expressions
of civilization: religion, ethics, art, literature and philosophy. Only in this way can they
define the particular quality of this phenomenon -always provided it exists- in the
civilization they are studying. This, essentially, is the intent of this work.

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FIRST PART
MYTHICAL AND HOMERIC SPORT
In Homer, sporting events are not related to religion. The gods help their
favoured athletes, who are all aristocrats, to victory as they do at all critical moments.
At times, the decision as to which boxer will win is left to the will of Apollo, who, as we
know from other sources, loved boxing. But there is never any reference to games
taking place with the intention of honouring a god. The perception that the gods are
pleased when they are honoured by athletic games, for instance in the same way as
they are pleased by sacrifices offered to them by the mortals, simply does not exist.
There is never any reference to games taking place in sacred places or to patron gods.
I will show later that funeral games, in Homer at least, have a loose and ill-defined
relationship to the worship of the dead. Nor is there any reference, among the many
contests in myth, to games taking place in honour of some god or generally under the
auspices of religion.
On the other hand, Olympic sports and those which derived from imitation of
them took place within the context of religion: the priesthood took an active part in their
organization. The prevalent opinion here is that the gods were pleased to be honoured
by athletic events. The games took place in holy locations, full of statues and altars of
the patron gods and heroes, whom they honoured with rituals and sacrifices. The
athletes sacrificed to the gods either to achieve victory or to thank them for it. They
consecrated their prizes to the gods. In general, the relationship between sport and
religion is presented as being very close. There are other differences, as we shall see
below, but these features alone were enough to change the face of the games. For this
reason it seems legitimate to make the distinction between mythical and Homeric
athletics on the one hand and Olympic athletics on the other.
CATEGORIES OF GAMES IN THE EPIC AND MYTH
Both in the epic as also in myth, mention is made only of games with no
religious elements, and this allows us to classify them in a general category. A more
careful investigation, however, will reveal that the games of the epic and myth are not
at all identical. They regularly differ as to the spirit and the object at which they aim but
also as to the moral conscience of the athletes. All of this justifies finer distinctions and
divisions.
Adopting as criteria the causes and the aims behind their organization, I would
recommend the division of the games of myth and the epic into the following six
categories: (a) Games which take place for clearly recreational purposes, as much as
for those who participate as for those who observe. The organizing of such games is
usually spontaneous; the games take place where the young men or warriors
exercised, in the market or near the camp. They do not aim at honouring a god or any
mortal -dead or living. No prizes are mentioned. Victory, and the honour which derives
from it, is the sole satisfaction. The games are of every category. And it seems that
nobles and commoners participated. Here there is only the joy of physical exercise, of
competition, of victory, and athletics are found here in their purest form. But since no
significant person or event is honoured, these games lack solemnity. On the other
hand, they are frequent: they are part of everyday life. (b) Games that are held
because of challenges and coercion with the exclusive aim of demonstrating the
superiority of the challenger. These contests are usually extremely ruthless and end
very badly -even in death- for one of the two competitors. Here, too, prizes are not
mentioned; victory is the sole satisfaction. It is not easy to say that the competitors

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enjoy the contest, that they also are entertained. The singularity of these contests is
that they concern only two people: no other contests are held; they are not
spontaneous; they do not have any connection with everyday life and the contests are
only wrestling and boxing. (c) Occasional games, like the previous ones, which are
held, in the main, not for the comparison of strength and athletic expertise, but for the
acquisition of certain possessions, which can only metaphorically be considered as
prizes. Erix, for example, proposes a wrestling match to Hercules on the condition that
if the latter wins he will take his opponents country. But if he is beaten, then Erix will
win the oxen of Geryone. These games are held between nobles, but also between
commoners, such as Iros, who boxed with Odysseus while the latter was disguised as
a beggar. In this category, as in the previous one, the recreational element can exist,
but it concerns only the spectators and not those involved in the event. Besides, both
of these categories are characterized by infrequency: they have no connection with
everyday life or even with official holidays. Moreover, in both of these categories the
contest is held between only two people -in other words it resembles a duel- and the
events are wrestling and boxing. What distinguishes the contests of category (c) from
the previous one is the fact that the athletes are not contending to prove their
superiority. The material possessions which will result from the victory are so important
that they comprise the major objective. This essential element is entirely absent from
the previous category. (d) Official events in honour of dead kings (funeral). In these,
only nobles participate. In order to appear generous, the kings who organize them
offer considerable prizes, though we would not be justifying in saying that this was the
motive for the athletes to compete. Here are combined honour to the dead person,
entertainment, spectacle, the aspiration for superiority and glory and, lastly, the desire
to win valuable prizes, which were, at the same time mementos of the dead king.
These games are particularly characteristic -the Olympic Games may originate from
them- and must constitute a different category, despite the fact that a funeral is both a
religious and a social phenomenon, and therefore the funeral games could also be
placed in the following category, (e) where I place those games which take place for
social and political reasons, mostly the marrying of children, but also the celebration of
a victory etc. In a final category (f) I place the instructional games, though only by
assumption. The objective of instructional games was to strengthen the body to make
it capable of military deeds.
I do not consider the above divisions satisfying from all aspects. Games are a
part of life, and life does not shape itself in a way which accommodates theorists. The
distinctions which I propose seem to me simply to engender fewer reservations, and I
would remind readers that I have made them purely for methodological reasons.
1. Recreational games. In Homer, games are mentioned which are a natural
part of everyday life. We read, almost at the beginning of the Iliad, that the warriors
amused themselves with discus throwing, javelin throwing and archery. If among the
warriors, who were in enforced idleness, there was a particularly skilful rider, he may
have performed feats such as jumping from one horse to another, as we find in
rhapsody XV of the Iliad. This was something very much akin to acrobatics and is
reminiscent of bull-running. The athlete exhibits his skill alone, in other words without
an opponent.
On the hospitable island of the Phaeacians, Odysseus and king Alkinoos
attend athletic games and dancing, where the young Phaeacians exercise and dance
so as to show their superiority, their quality, while the spectators watch and marvel.
Even the suitors entertained themselves with discus and javelins in the stone-
paved courtyard which was always used as a place of entertainment. Odysseus once
fought against Philomilides on Lesbos after a dispute. His victory brought great joy to
the Achaeans. When Tideus, who was of small build but feisty with it, went as a
messenger to Thebes and found the local citizens feasting at the palace of Eteocles,
although alone amongst many strangers, he challenged all the Thebans and beat

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everyone who fought him. After one challenge, Eros fought Hermes and was beaten. A
challenge is, of course, a way of challenging someone to a contest. When it is made
with all due respect, it does not breach the concept of fair competition.
In my opinion, the games mentioned above comprise the simplest and most
spontaneous form of sport. Part of everyday life, they are organized purely for the
entertainment of the spectators and the joy that the athletes feel in demonstrating their
expertise and superiority. Here no god, hero or dead person is being honoured. The
gods do not intervene to help an athlete and in general no metaphysical or other factor
intervenes. Not even prizes are mentioned.
If we had to define the usual frame of mind of the athletes in such events -and
that of the spectators, who identify themselves with them- we would say that the ideal
of victory, of distinction, predominates, but not in a forced way, so that the person is
incited to neglect every other value and principle, to become the victim of hubris, the
transgression of mortal and divine rules and limits. The athlete will use all his talent
and strength to win, but will not intend to slay his opponent. This outlook also assigns
significance to entertainment, so that it does not permit the athlete to be in the grip of
warlike emotions, contrary to the spirit of entertainment. Lastly, there is no room in the
athlete’s outlook for any metaphysical ideas or others from outside sport, since no god
or king is being honoured. Everything is realistic and human.
2. Games which are held as a result of challenge and coercion. When an
athlete, from excessive confidence in his abilities and strength, challenges everyone,
even the gods, thus falling prey to hubris, he then provokes the just retribution, that is
nemesis, of gods and men. Hercules and Eurytos, both excellent archers, compete
with the gods, says Homer; but he adds about Eurytos that Apollo killed him, because
he challenged him to an archery contest. Orion, who was killed because he challenged
Artemis to an archery contest, suffered the same fate. The gods do not deign to
compete with arrogant people first and then punish them afterwards. The insolent act
of the challenge itself is cause enough for them to kill them. The behaviour of Apollo
and Artemis towards the blasphemous challenge is no different from that of famous
mortals. Only that they first had to compete. It is characteristic that those who issued
challenges also habitually killed those whom they had vanquished. Here we have
hubris towards strangers, whom the gods protected. Such an athlete was Antaeus,
whom Hercules killed.
Similar to Hercules was Theseus, who is regarded as the inventor of the art of
wrestling. He beat and killed Cercyon who challenged strangers to wrestle and then
killed them. He beat him by technique (wisdom), because until then athletes had relied
only on the size of their bodies and on strength.
The boxing match between Polydeuces and Amycus, which was considered as
the bout par excellence after the famous descriptions of Apollonius from Rhodes, and
of Theocritus, was also a contest which started with a challenge. According to
Apollonius Amycus forced his visitors to box with him. He killed many strangers, but
finally Polydeuces beat him and killed him. Theocritus relates this story somewhat
differently. The Dioscouroi meet Amycus at a spring and he challenges them to a
contest. During the contest Polydeuces does not kill Amycus, accepts his
acknowledgment of defeat, but puts him under oath not to behave in a provocative way
towards strangers. This moral ending must be an invention of Theocritus.
From these brief examples, it is, I think, clear how much the spirit of the games
in this category differs from those which we described in the previous chapter.
Arrogant and bloodthirsty athletes challenge and force strangers to compete and slay
them in bouts which resemble duels. We are, of course, far removed from the spirit of
Homeric and Olympic athletics, but also from the morality which was in place
concerning strangers. The authors who narrate these old stories were fully aware of
this. Hubris towards strangers is punished in the end. Someone stronger appears,
beats and kills them. We see here the familiar scheme of Ancient Greek ethics:

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arrogance -hubris- punishment. These things do not exist in the games of the other
categories. The characteristic of these games is that they take place only between two
people -they are not held simultaneously with other games- they have no connection
with everyday practice, and the contests are only wrestling and boxing, which are
particularly tough and painful(18) and may end in the death of the opponent. The
contest resembles more a duel à l’outrance. It can hardly be said, therefore, that the
athletes enjoy the event, unless we consider warlike emotions to be joy.
The frame of mind of an athlete who challenges in this way and with these
intentions is governed in a “pathological” manner by the idea of victory. To him victory,
according to the laws of battle and not of sport, usually coincides with the physical
extermination of the opponent. The absolute dominion of the idea of victory incites the
individual to override every moral value and principle. The value of human life and the
rights of the stranger, who is protected by common law, are ignored. His successes,
which of course are founded on some actual ability, lead the individual to arrogance
and boastfulness and thence to hubris, the transgression of human limitations.
If the pattern is true, by which mankind is gradually emerging and progressing
towards more peaceful forms of life, then this category of sport represents, or, better,
is a remnant of older forms of sport. But the soundness of the pattern to which we
referred gives rise to many doubts. It is not easy to confirm the progress of mankind
towards the good and there are not a few people who would have serious cause to
maintain that from many points of view we are sliding backwards: an age such as our
own seems more barbaric than ancient times. But above all, one wonders why should
not the oldest form of sport be that which has the closest link to recreation and play,
which are peaceful things? Why would the athletes in older times -usually adolescents-
not have wanted to play and relax, but would rather have been looking to slay each
other? Do we imagine that three or four thousand years ago people did not feel the
pure joy of movement and effort and that they did not wish to wrestle with friends they
loved? I personally believe that the form of sport which I have described first, the
peaceful form, is actually the older. The fact that they lived in a state of war led many
people to identify sport and war. When did this first occur? Not, of course, during
Greek history, nor three to five thousand years ago.
The Greeks condemned such forms of sport and did not include them in their
official programmes. This alone is sufficient to demonstrate the moral nature of Greek
sport. And it is easy to compare it with the notion of sport held by the Romans. At their
historical time, their main form of sport was gladiatorial combat, which ended in the
slaying of the opponent. This was the case even at the height of their civilization. So
for them, sport never had and never acquired the moral orientation it had in Ancient
Greece. Cretan-Mycenaean sport also had a moral orientation, though it was much
more a display of bodily skill and a spectacle. In bull-leaping, the athletes attempted to
fool the bull, which represented blind force, and thus stressed man’s intelligence and
ingenuity. Foot and chariot races, more peaceful forms of competition, were introduced
into the body of sports by the Mycenaean civilization and were very popular. It is
characteristic that at Olympia the first contest to be adopted was the foot race, which is
indubitably the most peaceful of competitions since it cannot result in the slaying of an
opponent and does not engender hostility, as do wrestling and boxing. So Hellenism
gave a moral orientation to sport, as it did to religion- it was only thus that we arrived at
Christianity- and, as to a separate child, attempted to give a similar orientation to the
arts. In the final analysis, Hellenism added morality above all to whatever it created or
borrowed. This does not, of course, mean that the Greeks were by nature any more
moral than other peoples, but their leaders were interested in making people more
moral and humane and tried to impose the moral view on all areas of activity.
3. Contests aimed at the acquisition of goods. In the widest sense, the
prizes which the winners won were certainly goods, sometimes valuable articles. It is

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not possible, however, to maintain that the athletes were motivated by the prizes, that
they competed solely in order to win the prizes because they were, supposedly, only
interested in the financial value of the prizes and relegated the joy of competing and of
victory to second place. Certainly there were occasions when the article which was the
prize weighed so heavily in the mind of the competitors that the joy of victory was
either secondary or non-existent. The sole interest of the contest was the winning of
the prize. For this reason I consider that this sort of contest constituted a separate
category.
A typical instance is the boxing match in which Odysseus, disguised as a
beggar is forced to participate against the professional beggar Iros. Antinous, who
proposed the contest, sets very unfavourable terms for the loser and favourable ones
for the winner. The prize ensuing from victory is very important: not food for one day,
but daily food. The simple boxing match becomes a fight for survival for Iros-
supposedly for Odysseus, too, who in any case at that moment is interested only in
securing his food. In the struggle which follows Odysseus is faced with the possibility
that he might kill Iros. But for fear of revealing his strength, he decides only to knock
him senseless, which he quickly does. The idea of Odysseus killing Iros is justified by
the arrogant behaviour of the beggar. In a normal sporting contest, Homer certainly
would not have reason to have Odysseus think such things. We might add that Iros
represented the common strata of society -the lowest, in fact- from whose part the
aristocrat Odysseus would not, of course, accept the slightest insult.
According to Apollodorus, when Hercules was seeking the ox which had
escaped from Geryones’ the herd, he came to Sicily, the country of king Erix, in
whose herds he found the ox which he was searching for. Erix declined to give it back
to him, unless Hercules beat him in a wrestling bout. Hercules accepted the challenge,
beat Erica three times and killed him. According to Pausanias, the two opponents
agreed that, if Hercules won, he would take Erix’ country; if on the other hand he lost,
his opponent would take the oxen of Geryones. In this myth, the significance of the
prize is obvious. In Pausanias’ version there is also the attraction of “all or nothing”,
which has in all ages induced many to stake whole fortunes. It involves a dangerous
wager -which is why many find it so alluring- that is outside the spirit of the games
which we have examined so far. The entertainment element exists only for the
spectators and not for the competitors. As in the previous category, so in this one, only
two people compete together; they are not, in other words, officially organized events
with the participation of many competitors who are competing in different contests; and
the general tone is closer to that of a duel. Besides, these games have no connection
with everyday life.
The attitude of the athletes -at least of one of the two- is dominated by the idea
of obtaining the something of which they have absolute need. The victory on its own is
of no interest to them and they are indifferent to the glory. The victory is only a means
of coming by the prize, nothing more. Odysseus does not believe that he will acquire
fame by thrashing a ridiculous, ranting beggar. Hercules does not fight Erix so as to be
glorified. He thinks only of getting back the ox and not losing the rest of the herd.
4. Funeral games. We come across the custom of honouring the dead with
sporting events in many countries: in Etruria, the Caucasus, in Ireland, in Siam and in
North America. In Greece the funeral games are lost in the depths of history.
In the realm of myth, the games which Acastus organized on the occasion of
the burial of his father Pelias were famous. These games were represented on the,
now lost, urn of Kypselus, which must date from the beginning of the 6th
century BC.
Pausanias saw the work and described the depictions. In these games, famous
aristocrats took part, such as Euphymus, Admitus, Jason, Peleus, Melanion -who we
will see contesting against Atalanta- and Iphiclus, who Nestor beat in a race and who
in these funeral games is presented with the wreath of victory by Acastus. On a
Corinthian amphora of the 6th
century BC Peleus is presented wrestling with

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Hippalcmus, the son of Pelops and Hippodamia. This bout may have occurred within
the context of the games for Pelias. Apollodorus assigns a wrestling bout between
Peleus and Atalanta to the same games. Here it is said that Peleus lost the contest.
According to Pausanias, though, Peleus fought Jason, and the result was a draw.
On returning from Colchis, the Argonauts came to Lemnos, where they took
part in the funeral games which were being held in honour of King Thoas, Hypsipyle’s
father, and of the husbands whom the Lemnian women had unjustly killed out of
jealousy. Pindar mentions the fact with relative appreciation. At the end of the 4th
Olympic victory ode, we see a winner accepting the wreath from Hypsipyle. According
to Philostratus, it was in these games that Jason, to please Peleus, combined five
contests into one and thus created the pentathlon.
In the Iliad, other than the famous funeral games which Achilles organized on
the occasion of the burial of Patroclus, two similar, older events are mentioned.
Euryalus took part in those games which took place in Thebes on the occasion of the
burial of Oedipus. Nestor relates his participation in the games which took place at
Bouprasium during the burial of King Amaryngeus. He boasts that in those games
there was no-one to match him. Homer’s inspiration of inserting -in cameo- funeral
games which took place in the past among the funeral games taking place in the
present time (the burial of Patroclus) is excellent. We have a spectacle within a
spectacle, which is now tinged with nostalgia. Lastly, the Odyssey mentions the funeral
games which were organized on the occasion of the burial of Achilles.
The view has been expressed that the Olympics originated from funeral
games, which seems to contain a core of truth, as we will see in the relative chapter.
The problems which we have to face here are whether the games constituted an
integral part of the worship of the dead, whether they should be placed in the same
category as the main funeral rites, whether some contests, such as armed dueling,
were a substitute for ancient human sacrifices and, lastly -and most importantly- if the
perception existed that the games pleased and appeased the spirit of the dead person,
in other words whether they functioned along the lines of sacrifices. Because if the
opposing view was held- that the dead have no inkling of and are not influenced in any
way by athletic games- how is it possible for worship and rituals to come into the
matter?
There is no support for any of the above concepts in the Homeric texts. Not
even the most inventive reader could find one ritual idea. And it is true that such ideas
are not necessary to explain the reason why Achilles and the other kings occasionally
organized athletic games on the occasion of the burial of their friends. Sporting events
were part of everyday life. With the element of competition they contained, with the
suspense as to the outcome, intensified by support for a particular athlete, and lastly
with their aspect as a spectacle, they certainly constituted the most popular
entertainment of the people of the ancient world. It is therefore natural that at any large
gathering there was always the “expectation” that athletic games would be held. Those
who were in a position to organize games knew this very well. And they also knew that
if they organized the games for the reception of a stranger, to celebrate a victory or a
wedding, or to honour a deceased person etc., the games would acquire added
splendour and would perpetuate in the memory the reason for which they were held.
All the more so if lavish prizes were awarded. Particularly in the case of funeral games,
organizers were given the opportunity to hand out treasures and mementos of the
dead person as awards. Such mementos could be the dead person’s weapons or
other objects which belonged to him, but also other objects which would simply remind
people of him, because they were won at the games organized on the occasion of his
burial. For their part, the athletes would “do their best” as we would say, seeing as the
moment called for it and because there were more spectators.
How little athletic games counted with Homer as a necessary element of the
funeral rite can also be seen from the fact that the Achaeans began to leave after the
burial rites and the construction of the monument to Patroclus. And it was only then

10
that Achilles held them back by stating his intention of holding sporting contests. How
was it that the Achaeans were starting to disperse without realizing that athletic games
- which they loved so much- would follow? The answer is, of course, a severe blow to
the theory that athletic games were connected with and constituted a part of the
worship of the dead. If someone aims increase the splendour of a ceremony in any
manner at his disposal in that era, this does not mean that this is an organic part of the
ceremony. Besides, if it were an element in the worship of the dead and not a custom
of kings aiming at grandeur and posterity -“secular” things of course- then common
mortals would also attempt to hold at least some sort of symbolic sporting contest. If
the rich were in the position to slaughter a hundred oxen, the poor at least would have
killed a cockerel. My conclusion is that that the athletic games were the purely secular
part of the burial– just as they were in Homer- and that only kings organized them with
an eye to grandeur and posterity. Some other kings of the same people or of
neighbouring peoples understood the benefits and imitated them. By similar token, the
former borrowed from the latter the practice of organizing athletic games for the
weddings of their children.
To the fundamental question as to whether the concept existed that the games
also delighted the spirit of the deceased person, in whose honour they were organized,
the answer is a firm “No”. The soul of Patroclus is entirely absent. Neither Achilles nor
the athletes address it, nor do they imply that it watched the games. One text, which
comes from the Odyssey however, absolutely precludes this (XXIV 85-92)(40). It is
clear from this text that, despite the divine favour he had enjoyed in his life, Achilles’
soul did not and could not attend the games which were organized in its honour, and
therefore could not enjoy or be influenced in one way or another by the games. But
then how is it possible for the games to be considered religious ceremonies and part of
the worship of the dead? These matters, I believe, presuppose the idea of and belief in
the possibility of some sort of communication and influence. Otherwise they would
have no raison d’être, no reason to exist. Therefore the games were not organized to
please the soul of the dead person or with the intent of influencing its condition in the
other world in one way or another. They took place so as to lend magnificence to the
burial and they were aimed at posterity. Their objectives were secular not religious.
The Homeric texts cannot support any other opinion.
Despite the fact that the funeral games as a whole were aimed at honouring a
dead king, the athletic spirit in them remained untouched and unaffected. Respect and
honour for the deceased certainly existed in the consciousness of the athletes -
likewise in that of those watching. But it did not impinge upon the pursuit of victory. In
Homer, the behaviour and aims of the athletes and the expectations of the spectators
were not influenced by the spirit of the funeral. No-one saw the contests as symbolic
and there is no suggestion that the games -or any contest whatever- had a ceremonial
character. Because these games had formality and were watched by masses of
people, the athletes made every effort to do their best. This earnestness prefigures the
formality of the Olympic Games and is an element which does not exist in the other
categories mentioned so far.
The prizes had dual significance. They were awards, as were those in other
games, which symbolized the victory, the superiority of the athlete, which is why, of
course, they did not sell them, but kept them with pride. At the same time, however,
they were mementos of the dead person.
In certain instances, with certain great kings, these games were held at regular
intervals, just as the Olympics were and are. In these regular games -which are never
referred to in the epics or mythology- we must recognize the character of a religious
ceremony: the mortals honoured were now made heroes and there was a conviction
that it was possible for them to effect the fortunes of people and for them to be affected
by the actions of the living. The underlying concept, then, is entirely different from that
in Homer. Many believe that in Homer the funeral games had degenerated and had

11
become secular. I believe the opposite. Funeral games first were secular in nature and
only later were associated closely with the worship of certain heroes.
It is beyond doubt that other peoples also held funeral games. Many scholars
believe that in Greece the Olympics arose from such games. If this is so, then only in
Greece did this happen. i.e. that sport passed from the sphere of the formal into that of
the really notable and sublime and thence into the sphere of the spirit. The same is
true, of course, even if the Olympics did not originate in funeral games.
5. Games with social and political causes. Social or political considerations
were sometimes the occasion for organizing athletic games. One such reason would
be the wedding of a daughter of aristocratic family or probable succession to the
throne, in which case the reasons are both social and political. The luxury of
organizing such games could naturally only be undertaken by those of royal lineage,
and clearly those who were not aristocrats were excluded a priori.
There are reasons which would allow us to place these games in the previous
category. If the games are seen from the viewpoint of the suitors, one might say that
they were contending for the acquisition of important possessions: a desirable spouse,
an inheritance or possible succession to the throne. The same conclusion will be
reached if we see the games from the point of view of the organizers, who would have
wanted to ensure a worthy suitor for their child, seeing as, according to a primitive
concept, strength is the basic element of a man’s superiority. But the emphasis on
formality and the clearly social and political character of these games seems to me
sufficient reason for placing them in a different category, though with some
reservations.
In an ode which has been lost Pindar related that, in order to win Deianeira,
Hercules fought with the River Achelous, who assumed the form of a bull. The contest
seems not to have been organized by the maiden’s father, Achelous was already
engaged to Deianeira (and therefore Hercules challenged him to a fight). After the
death of her brother and the transformation of four of her five sisters into birds,
Deianeira together with her sister Gorge were the remaining heiresses to their father’s
kingdom. Achelous lost both the contest and his lost the contest and his bride, but not,
of course, his life, since he was a river god and therefore immortal.
According to one myth, Hercules also took part in an archery contest, in order
to win Ιole. Eurytus, king of Oechalia and a renowned archer, proclaimed that he would
give his daughter as a prize to the person who could beat him and his sons at archery.
Hercules took part in the contest and won (thereby beating his tutor in the art of the
bow). But they did not give Iole to him, for the reason that that any children born from
the marriage would be in danger, since Hercules, in his madness, had killed his
children by Megara.
A great athlete who ranked with Theseus and Hercules was Peleus. He fought
against Atalanta and Hippalcmus. At the funeral games in Lemnos he won the
pentathlon. Peleus was charged with a serious accusation: that he and his brother
Telamon deliberately killed their brother Phocus in a sporting event, because he was a
better athlete than them. For this murder they were exiled from their homeland.
However, the contest between Peleus and Thetis was popular. According to one
version, Thetis married Peleus, because the gods asked it of her. According to the
second version, Peleus fought with Thetis herself, in order to win her hand. The
contest was very difficult, because Thetis continually changed her form. This change of
form does not seem to be for the goddess to regain her strength: she was more likely
trying to escape. This leads us to the motif of the abduction of the maiden, and
Herodotus is especially clear on this: Thetis was carried off by Peleus. The words of
Apollodorus point to the same conclusion and certain depictions on vases show Thetis
fleeing, with Peleus at her heels. However most of the vase-paintings from the 6th
century BC show an athletic contest -and especially wrestling- in which Peleus
struggles to overcome his opponent by using a variety of holds, with many divine

12
beings, mostly water-nymphs, looking on. The main interest of these depictions,
therefore, lies not so much in the transformations of the goddess as in the actual
wrestling match.
Atalanta, of whom more will be said later, was a wild virgin who wished to
maintain her virginity, as did Artemis. She was raised in the mountains by hunters and
had exceptional athletic skills. To the suitors who sought her hand she suggested a
foot race. The prospective groom would run in front of her and she would pursue him.
If she caught him, she killed him. She killed a good many suitors, but lost in the end to
Hippomenes and was compelled to marry.
The daughters of Danaus were haunted by the spectre of the murder of their
husbands, to whom they had been married by force. So their father thought of offering
his daughters as a prize in a foot race. Wilamovitz conjectures that Aeschylus’
Suppliants trilogy closed with this contest.
According to Pindar, the Libyan king, Antaeus, followed Danaus’s lead.
According to Pausanias, Icarus also imitated Danaus, in order to give his daughter,
Penelope, in marriage.
Possibly the most famous mythical contest in this category is the chariot race
between king Oenomaus and Pelops for the hand of Hippodameia. The interest of this
race is that it is set in Olympia and that it was regarded as the mythological model of
the Olympic Games. From the field of literature, the oldest testimony is that of Pindar.
In the first Olympic Ode the poet relates how Pelops decided to ask for Hippodameia’s
hand, despite the great danger which this undertaking presented. Indeed Oenomaus
killed the suitors whom he beat in the chariot race (he had already killed thirteen so
far). Pelops asked Poseidon to help him, and the god gave him a golden chariot and
winged horses. In this way, with the god’s help, he beat Oenomaus and won the
maiden. Other versions, however, which were better known in the ancient world, do
not mention divine assistance. Pelops won with the help of the charioteer Myrtilus who
took the wedge out of Oenomaus’ chariot wheel, thus causing the vehicle to overturn.
Some held that Oenomaus was killed in the fall, while according to others Pelops
himself killed the king. This form the of myth, which also seems older, acquired great
popularity during the 5th
century BC, as can be seen from two tragedies- one by
Sophocles and the other by Euripides, both entitled Oenomaus- from the famous east
pediment of Zeus’s temple in Olympia and from many red figure vase paintings.
If we consider that the myth reflects a historical fact and deal rationally with its
theme, we are bound to find the father’s conduct strange, since he himself raced
against and killed the suitors, instead of having them race each other to single out the
best. Diodorus mentions the explanation that there existed an oracle which said that
Oenomaus would die as soon as he gave his daughter in marriage, while Apollodorus
presents us with the more widespread view that Oenomaus was himself in love with
his daughter, and that she refused to accept such an unholy union.
Modern hermeneutics regarding myths has dealt with the theme in an entirely
different way. According to Cornford, the relative myths reflect repetitive practices of
rituals or rites; the chariot races aimed at capturing the spirit of abundance for that
year; the Olympic Games resulted from successive additions to the original contest.
According to Drees, mythology confirms, through this myth, “the recollection of the
expulsion or repulsion of the local wine worship of Oenomaus by the general
agricultural worship of Pelops”.
The myth of Pallene depends on the myth of Oenomaus. According to the
myth, the maiden’s father asked the suitors to compete against him in a chariot race,
the loser to forfeit his life. When, in time, the king lost his strength, he preferred to have
two entrants, Dryas and Cleitus, compete against each other. The pedagogue of
Pallene, who learnt of her love for Cleitus, saw to it that the charioteer damaged Dryas’
chariot, exactly as Myrtilus did.
Penelope proposed an archery contest to her suitors, with herself as the prize.
The idea, which aimed at the death of her suitors, was inspired by Athena. The terms

13
of the contest -passing an arrow through the holes of twelve axes in a row- belong to
the realm of poetic fantasy.
To the games which had a social cause must also be added the foot race
which Endymion, the king of Helis, organized in Olympia between his sons. It was a
contest for the succession of the throne. The winner was Epeius. The reaction of his
brothers is typical. One of them, Aetolus, remained at home, though not it seems for
long, judging by the fact that he gave his name to Aetolia. The other brother, Paeon,
bore the loss badly and went as far away as he could. Paeonia, the country above the
Axius, was named after him. Behind this typical contest for power lies the ancient
concept that whoever is naturally the strongest is the best fitted for the throne, just as
he was also the most suitable to be a princess’s husband in the previous examples.
The idea that natural might is right is predominant, and this is characteristic of primitive
societies.
In historical times, no Greek would have considered marrying his child off in
this manner and even among less cultivated peoples the worship of physical strength
has diminished. For the well-rounded character, strength is only one aspect of the
virtues to be desired. Historical Greece admired an exceptional physical constitution
and considered it essential for a notable man but had left behind the one-sided
worship of sheer strength.
The problem of whether wager events preceded glory/prize events
chronologically cannot, of course, be solved by study of Greek sport, which is “recent”
in comparison with the millennia which went before. In the Greek territories, settling a
wager by sporting contest tended to disappear from life, but not from mythology, in
which it thrived until even after the Hellenistic period. Contributing factors in the decline
of such contests were social differences and the progress of moral values. Only
wealthy aristocrats had the opportunity to marry off their children with games, though
they rarely resorted to this measure because even early on the notion that the
strongest was fittest to govern had lost ground. Besides, events such as those of
Hercules and Theseus were spontaneous and sport which had acquired enormous
dimensions could not be satisfied with occasional games. Formally organized games
were required and these eventually pushed the occasional ones into obscurity.
Besides, the latter type of sporting event contained elements which were not
consistent with the newer Greek morality, which is why they were gradually expelled
from the body of Greek sport. We can, therefore, talk about moral progress when we
see the Greeks abandoning such events in practice.
6. Instructional Games. In myth and the epic we do not find people devoting
themselves to athletics in order to increase or maintain their physical strength. In
mythology, of course, which is concerned with men who are already complete and not
with those under instruction, this is quite logical. What happens in Homer, though?
Must we assume that in his time there were no sports which had an instructional
purpose? This opinion seems entirely improbable with regard to a warlike people
among whom sport was exceptionally widespread. All the heroes -and also the
spectators- knew the rules of the contests, which meant that they had been taught by
specialist tutors. And certainly they were interested in teaching athletics to their
children. Of course, no one is born an athlete, but rather is made one.
What did the lessons concerning athletics aim at? Merely at making somebody
outstanding at certain contests? Or were they part of military training? We know that
various athletic events were close to war, as this was fought in antiquity. It was a
series of duels, where, if a man’s weapons failed him -which was all too probable- he
was forced to use anything which came to hand, stones, pieces of wood etc., and, as
a last resort, his hands and feet. Among the oldest contests was armed combat,
though this was later done away with. Fleetness of foot was a warlike virtue, useful
both in pursuit and in flight. Aristocrats often fought in chariots and one of the most
important contests was the chariot race. The chariot was first an instrument of war and

14
only later of sport. Archery and javelin throwing had a direct connection to war;
similarly stone-throwing and discus-throwing. It would be difficult to deny that
instruction and practice in all these contests was considered part of military training.
The physical training of the young men, which had an educational purpose,
must also of course have been in the nature of entertainment. By the same token, and
conversely, events which were nominally for entertainment could also have had an
educational purpose. We saw Achilles’ warriors on their rest days keeping themselves
occupied with sports. They did it, of course, for entertainment. But can we exclude the
possibility that they were exercising to maintain their fitness, since, for the time being,
they were not involved in the war? And were the young men on the island of the
Phaeacians exercising merely for entertainment, never to train? Did they never take
part in instructional events, where an expert explained to them what to do and what to
avoid?
In the impressionable consciousness of a young man who was undergoing
training they inculcated the notion of supremacy and glory, which can also be attained
through sporting prowess. The young men adopted this ideal, each to a different
degree, depending on their character and physical capability. The young man
Laodamas, who won at boxing, already believed that there was no glory greater than
that of a victory in sporting contests, a doctrine capable of thrilling the minds of young
men and turning them towards sport and one which trainers would certainly use in
order to win over the young men. Laodamas also conveys this idea to Odysseus,
precisely in order to urge him to compete. From the way he speaks one would think
that he was passing on the credo of a former student, who now identifies with his
masters.
An examination of the mythical games -not the Homeric- forces us to conclude
that the games always constitute a means for achieving certain purposes, which are
viewed by many as “non-sporting”. The games which took place on the island of the
Phaeacians -and certainly in other towns of Greece- and which are characterized
merely by the pursuit of victory and glory are not mentioned in mythology. We must be
careful how we interpret this phenomenon.
An easy explanation is that the mythical games describe a society and a
concept older and somewhat different from that of Homer. If, indeed, we were to
espouse the opinion that the athletic spirit is distinguished by the exclusive desire to
measure one’s mettle and by love for oneself, we would then conclude that at the
beginning Greek athletics was not yet “competitive”, since other, non-sporting aims
impinge upon it. This also presupposes that all the myths which we have mentioned
date from a world older than that referred to in Homer.
In my own view, it is perfectly legitimate for athletics to have other, parallel
aims, apart from the pursuit of victory and glory, without ceasing to be “genuine”. In the
first place, the aim of instruction is not at all non-sporting. But what about the other
aims, especially the outrageous prizes? When, in a sporting contest, life and
possessions -even whole kingdoms- are at stake, the significance of the prize
obviously dominates. But the significance of the prize is not alien to athletics. We saw
that athletics is closely related to war: in war the victor is glorified, but he also takes all.
In a similar way, the victorious athlete can win very many things, on condition, of
course, that it is agreed. It is fruitless to conjecture as to the financial sum beyond
which a prize ceases to be “sporting”. Answers can, of course, be given, but these will
be based on personal evaluation and on the moral values of a particular time or circle.
We are naturally entitled to prefer one category of aims and to require another to be
excluded. But we may not assert that the category of purposes which we consider
superior alone expresses the “genuine” sporting spirit and that every other purpose is
non-athletic. I would recall here that mythical games can be defined as wagers, which
are decided by matching physical abilities. Were anyone, according to his own moral

15
code, to remove the element of the wager from sport, he would certainly be cutting his
coat according to his cloth.
Whether the wager-contests precede the glory/prize contests chronologically is
a problem which cannot be resolved by a study of Greek athletics, which is a recent
phenomenon, compared to the millennia of sport which preceded them. In the Greek
territories, the wager-contest tended to disappear from practice but not from myth,
where it continued to survive even after the Hellenistic age. This means that the
authors and their readers regarded them as a genuine form of sport. Homer certainly
knew of athletics in the myths -he speaks, for instance, of the sporting abilities of
Hercules- but does not mention any particular contests, probably because of lack of
interest.
The withdrawal in practice -though not in the imagination- of the wager-contest
is linked to social differences. It was, of course, only the rich aristocrats who had the
luxury of organizing sporting events in order to marry off their children. The slow but
steady rise of the non-aristocratic class of rich people contributed to the abandonment
of the idea that the most powerful person in terms of bodily strength was the best
suited to be king. Vision and intelligence were also required. So at least in the case of
marriage, the custom of hosting sporting events was abandoned, though in any case it
was never very widespread.
Contests of the type of those of Hercules and Theseus could hardly be other
than entirely spur of the moment occasions. Someone who enjoyed taking part in
sports would hardly wait for others to challenge him. Sports in urban centers took on
enormous dimensions and could hardly depend on occasional games. No officially
organized event could be an impromptu matter. It seems that events of this type were
always rare and remained so. If they are preferred in mythology it is because they
make for more lively interest, because of the risks involved, and because they
stimulate the imagination. On the other hand, however, they also contained elements
which were not easily reconciled with the rules of the newer moral order.
ESSENCE AND FEATURES OF THE HOMERIC CONTESTS
The body and the soul in Homer. Because, in sporting events, our interest is
centred on the corporeal dimension of the human being, we need now to look more
closely at this subject in Homer.
Ever since Plato, we have become used to seeing human nature as being
made up of two elements, which are radically different. On the one hand there is the
body, and on the other the soul, the spirit, the intellect. The body is the earthly part, the
transitory, the changeable, the blind, the non-divine, while the soul is enlightened,
incorruptible, and is of divine origin. The body is inferior, the soul superior. It is the
soul that constitutes all that is best in human existence. It is the soul that has the right
to govern our whole being. It is by nature dirigist. People are led into imbalance and
evil if they allow their bodies to take the reins. This stress on the dualism of soul and
body was inherited by Christianity, and so it now constitutes a fundamental element of
Western culture.
Scholars who are thus predisposed, who have these categories in mind and
then look for confirmation of them in Homer, will be quickly disillusioned. They will
search in vain for any radical separation between the body and the soul. The soul
exists, of course, but its significance and role are very different. Its role is not to
govern. It does not seek authority over the body and submit it to the service of certain
goals. The soul has no goals. No-one is interested particularly in his soul, whether to
enlighten it or to save it, despite the fact that the souls of great criminals -especially
those who were impious towards the gods- were punished in Hades. The soul had a
long life, since it survived the body, but there is no mention of immortality or divine
origin. There is no question of precedence or importance. The intellect is not a

16
possession or attribute of the soul. When someone died, the soul did not return to the
world, in order to be joined to another body. Its fate in Hades was wretched: it was a
mere vestige of the person it once had been. It remained a shade roaming a tenebrous
zone. Totally anaemic -an indication of its utter weakness- it had to drink a little blood
from whatever living people shed, in order to be somehow “rejuvenated”, in other
words in order to regain something of the body presence or to be revitalized by a
bodily power, which is the main feature of living people. The soul itself is aware of its
fate and of its weakness. Achilles says he would rather be alive and enslaved to a poor
man than be king of all the dead. Imprisoned in the darkness, the soul is unable to visit
the living. Achilles does not even know that his mother -a goddess- arranged funeral
games in his honour. These fundamental weaknesses of the soul naturally prevented it
from being of assistance to the living.
The basic conclusion is that, for Homer, the present life was the only one worth
a mention, and that the physical aspect was the more important. The Homeric heroes
live in the here and now and know that when they die the black darkness will swallow
them up and so they care very little, if at all, for their souls. They rejoice in this life,
know how to enjoy it and have no confidence in the hereafter. The most melancholy
note in the Iliad is that it reminds us that Achilles will die young. This is why Homeric
men are interested in acquiring glory as quickly as they can, before they end up as
shades in Hades. Their interest in sports is not unconnected with these convictions.
The quest for honour and glory. In a competitive type of society, such as the
Homeric, the quest for honours and glory was considered something which was
entirely befitting to a free man. Rivalry and the inclination to outstrip all-comers in
every field were encouraged in every way. The most characteristic example of this way
of thinking are the words of Hippolochus to his son, Glaucon, who was setting out for
Troy, “Be ever the best and vie to outdo the others”, which successfully encapsulates
the educational intentions of the nobility. On the field of battle, the aristocrat appears to
have been absorbed by the idea of two basic values those of κλέος (fame) and κύδος
(celebrity), which are two aspects of glory. It is worth noting that the Iliad begins with
the promise of glory and ends with its acquisition.
Sporting events were one certain way for people to acquire glory. In order to
get Odysseus to take part in the Phaeacian Games, Antilochus, the son of king
Alcinous, tells him there is no greater glory than that which a man achieves with his
hands and feet. Pindar’s voice can also be heard in these verses. The other son of
Alcinous, Euryalus, responds with insulting words to Odysseus’ polite refusal. In his
view, the stranger knows nothing about games (the insinuation being that to be an
athlete was a common requirement for any man of note). He concludes, “He doesn’t
look like an athlete”, which to the ears of an aristocrat in ancient times would have
sounded like an insult. Odysseus rejects this wounding reproach and, taking a heavy
discus, hurls it farther than the marks of the other athletes.
Even the modest King Alcinous wanted Odysseus to watch the games in order
to gain the respect of his guest, so that when Odysseus returned to his own country,
he would talk of the superiority of the Phaeacians in the various events.
Glory and honour confer prosperity because the man who wins glory gains the
respect of others. This is the greatest good and ensures that he will be remembered by
later generations. Odysseus is of the opinion that Achilles has reached the bounds of
human happiness, thanks to the divine honours he was granted while he was still alive.
Because people are mortal, they must expend every effort in this short life to
win glory and in this way to gain immortality. The ideal is to taste glory while still alive,
to have a foretaste of immortality. That is the most sublime bliss. There is no bliss in
Hades. There you can have the respect of the entire dead, can be their king, but it will
not bring you any great joy. Life here on earth is preferable, even without glory. But
when life here is crowned with glory, then a mortal man reaches the pinnacle of
happiness and has nothing better to hope for. All he needs to beware of is conceit and

17
the desire to be compared to the gods. Eurytus was punished for his contumely. It
seems they forgave Hercules because they loved him. In the scale of values of Homer
and of Hellenism, life here and now is at the very top, immediately followed by the
respect of one’s fellows and glory. The good things which follow -riches, noble
ancestry, robustness of body and skill, cleverness and beauty- are not sufficient in
themselves. They are useful only when they serve the first values of life and glory.
Complete happiness is achieved only when someone has these. Much lower down on
the scale of value come the good things of the nether world, which are not named
except for having a good name. But then how could they be named, since corporeality,
intelligence, beauty and so on are characteristics only of the living?
The meaning of “sport” and victory. For the Homeric aristocrat, one
important way of acquiring glory was αγών (sport). We might agree that the notion of
“sport” contains two basic elements, which are interwoven in a rather strange and
perhaps unique way: gravity and play.
Gravity comes from the unfailing desire of the athletes to prove their superiority
and from their refusal to concede that someone else is better than them. From the
moment that someone considers himself gifted in a certain field, he believes himself
invincible and does not hesitate to declare himself so. Obviously, his standing and his
fame are at risk during a match. The gods themselves take games absolutely
seriously, which is why they intervene to give fighting spirit and celebrity to the athletes
they favour. Just how seriously they took athletic games is indicated by how they took
defeat so much to heart.
The fact that sport is also a game, is, however, equally evident. A game rests
on certain conditions, certain rules which the players are bound to respect. Similarly,
there are rules in sporting contests, which are, moreover, so familiar to all the athletes
and the spectators, that the poet does not need to refer to them. It is evident when we
are dealing with a game rather than military action, because the game is stopped if
someone’s life is seriously endangered. This, of course, is possible only in the context
of a game. What distinguish a sporting contest from battle are the absence of real
hostility and the admixture of gravity and play. Finally, the notions of enjoyment and
spectacle, as also that of anxiety as regards the outcome, features which are part and
parcel of play, are also encountered fully in sporting events. This explains the range of
terms in many languages which cover overlapping notions such as “match”, “game”
and “play”.
The notion of a sport, like that of play, also includes the notion of wager. In a
wager, two abilities -corporeal and other- compete under certain conditions, in order to
determine which of them is superior either in a particular instance or more generally. In
a pure wager, the notion of esteem is limited (glory does not enter into it) while the
prize for the winner may vary from the mediocre to the exceptionally valuable,
depending on the terms. In mythical matches whole kingdoms are sometimes at stake.
Many instances of mythical matches, in particular, might be defined as wagers which
were decided by athletes measuring their prowess.
The notion of sport always includes an aim. The basic aim is that of proving
superiority, which involves respect, fame and glory. For some, this is the sole purpose
of pure athletics. In certain cases, the prizes on offer are so valuable that the notion of
fame takes second place. Those who compete, do so for the prize most of all. An aim
is never absent from sport, even when it takes place for training purposes, when there
is no glory attached or any significant prize. The aim here is to develop the body. In
general, sport without purpose is impossible to imagine. The idea of “sport for sport’s
sake”, which is supposedly not permeated by any aim, seems to me to be one which
exists neither in practice nor in theory. Depending on the moral values they represent,
people are, of course, at liberty to hope for the triumph of one category of goals or to
wish for the elimination of another. I believe, however, that they are in error if they

18
maintain that only the category which they consider superior actually expresses the
“pure” athletic spirit.
The idea of victory has its roots in the desire to overcome and to be superior,
which are also clearly apparent in war, too. Victory in athletic games was equally
desirable and conferred the same glory as a victory in war, since it proved equally the
superiority of the athlete, who was also a warrior. In a good number of myths which do
not come from the Homeric epics, we observe the phenomenon of the victor slaying
the vanquished. It would seem that these myths preserve recollections from older
forms of athletics, which were very close indeed to war. In Homer, a trace of such a
concept is the tourney which took place on the occasion of the funeral of Patroclus.
Usually in Homer, however, the opponent is not confronted as a real enemy, but as a
notional, conventional one, and is therefore not utterly defeated, not slain. The victor
respects the life of his opponent and helps him to his feet. The “promoter” and
spectators would not allow the life of one of the two contestants to be put at risk. If this
were so, the match was stopped.
It is also useful to define the notion of defeat. The shining prowess of the
defeated hero is dulled, dimmed by shame, in just the same way as he who is
defeated in battle. Menelaus, who is not favoured by the gods, says to Antilochus, who
overtook him in a chariot race: “By cutting across me with your own far slower pair you
have made my prowess look contemptible and robbed my horses of a win”. Just how
humiliating defeat was is shown by the trouble he causes and the demand that the
result be referred to arbitration and that Antilochus should swear an oath that he
participated fairly and did not win by trickery. Achilles, however, donates prizes to all
the athletes, winners and losers alike, in an effort to honour the virtues of the
vanquished, too, and to assuage the shame of defeat.
Closely linked to victory are the prizes, about which much has already been
said. It may be that the prizes also had their origin in the field of warfare and, in
particular, in the opportunity it gave to the victor to seize the goods of the vanquished:
weapons, valuables, money and so on. In some of these contests from the realm of
myth, which in any case are like duels, the winner receives the prize from the
vanquished, just as he would have done with spoils of war. The oldest prizes taken
from the person defeated must have been spoils which had been seized, such as
those distributed by Achilles at the funeral games for Patroclus.
Apart from their monetary value, the prizes had mostly a symbolic meaning.
They made the victory visible and confirmed the athlete’s glory. This is why they did
not make any use of them, but rather kept them and showed them off with pride. Later
they would dedicate them to temples, just as they did the weapons of the enemy,
which were also symbols of victory.
As we have seen, Achilles ordained that there be prizes for all the athletes,
victors and vanquished, thus honouring those who happened to have been defeated
even though they were very capable. So Achilles affords himself a certain licence as
regards the awarding of prizes, a freedom which he uses, however, with great
astuteness and humanity, and also with diplomacy. This enriches the Homeric
contests with an immediacy and humanity which are not to be found again in ancient
times, much less in our day and age.
The prizes distributed by Achilles may be considered valuable for a relatively
poor people, as the Greeks were at the time described by Homer. This has given some
scholars cause to muse darkly upon which carried the greater weight: the honour
being paid to Patroclus or the prizes. Weiler dwells emphatically on the monetary side
of the prizes and ignores the symbolic value. He designates only two motives: the
desire to honour the dead and to win valuable prizes, forgetting the motive of glory and
honour. But the athletes were also kings, rich enough already, or at least as wealthy as
Achilles. When Menelaus loses the chariot race, he does not for a moment think of the
prizes. His sole concern is his personal celebrity, which has been clouded by defeat.
So why does Homer mention the material value of the prizes at all? We have seen that

19
the poet also describes impromptu contests, without prizes. But the funeral games
described in rhapsody ΧΧΙΙΙ of the Iliad were being held to honour the closest friend of
Achilles, a great king. In this case, it was Achilles duty to show magnanimity, the prime
expression of which is generosity. By mentioning the value of the prizes, Homer is at
pains to show the generosity of Achilles above all. Achilles himself, however, despite
having decided to award valuable prizes, prefers to emphasize something else. When
he offers Nestor a double-handed, shallow bowl, he says “Here, my venerable lord, is
a keepsake for you also. Let it remind you of Patroclus’ funeral”. So the prizes he
distributes, apart from being merely symbols of victory and glory, are also considered
by him to be heirlooms and mementos of the burial of Patroclus. In saying this, it is not
my intention to play down the material aspect of the prize. I am simply attempting to
assign the correct balance to the various factors involved. So alongside the desire to
win, which was the dominant motive, there were also the prizes to be considered.
Homer tells us that in a chariot race that had taken place in the past, the contestants
had made mighty efforts to win, because the prizes had been so great. Let us not
forget, however, that the greatest prizes represented the greatest victory and it was
victory itself in the chariot race that was the more important.
The gods’ share in victory. That a good number of the gods were thought to
enjoy sport is beyond doubt. Artemis loves hunting, which is, of course, also a sport.
Apollo loves archery, but also boxing and running. Zeus and Poseidon both love
horses and chariots. Even sporting contests between the gods themselves are
recorded in myth, though not in Homer. It sometimes happens that people, in their
overweening pride, challenge the athlete gods to a match, but the gods do not deign to
compete with mortals and punish the offender.
The main problem to which we must find a solution is whether, at the time
recorded in the Homeric epics, mortals organized games in order to honour or placate
and in general to influence the gods, as with sacrifices, for instance. In other words,
were some contests of a religious nature, and did the gods oversee them, were they
considered protectors of athletic contests or of a particular sport?
A poet, then, who can hardly be considered a model of brevity, who describes
in detail or refers to many athletic contests and who is distinguished for his piety (I
would merely mention the extent to which the gods are everywhere present), still does
not make any reference at all to games of a religious nature, which were held with the
intention of honouring or influencing some god or other. And even if there were such
games in his times, the poet is silent about them. We may therefore affirm that sport in
Homer is independent of the worship of the gods.
The fact that the gods intervene in the athletic contests of mortals and lend
active support to some of the kings whom they favour (and, of course, impede the
others in their efforts to win), we should attribute this tactic to the general tendency of
the gods to interfere in the affairs of men -either as a result of having been asked, or
on their own initiative- particularly in battle, but also at other critical episodes in their
lives, rather than to some particular interest in sport. Sport is simply a good opportunity
for the gods to endow the king they favour with celebrity.
But victory is not necessarily the result of divine intervention, however. In the
boxing, Epeius wins purely through his skill and proper attitude. The same is true of
Polypoetus in the discus. Nestor does not advise his son to invoke the assistance of
the gods, not even Zeus and Poseidon who, in his view, loved his son. He is content
with his human abilities. He gives his son certain technical instructions which will help
him overcome his rivals, even though his horses are slower. He believes that victory is
won through skill, vigilance, cleverness and cunning. He also takes into account the
psychology of the athlete who has better horses and therefore neglects the
fundamental rules of the contest. In the final straight, his personal skill plays a major
role. So victory in Homer may be due solely to the proper attitude of hero, or to a
combination of mortal attributes and the favour of the gods.

20
It is important to note that divine protection does not detract from the brilliance
of a victory. Epeius’ victory in the boxing, which was achieved solely through his
personal abilities, is not presented as being more magnificent than that of Diomedes or
of Odysseus. Indeed, rather the opposite is true. The celebrity with whom the hero is
invested increases his brilliance and status. Are we, then to say, with Pindar, that a
victory won without the assistance of the gods is “marred”? This idea is certainly latent,
but in my view there is no need to go quite so far.
A sporting victory in Homer, then, has its source both in the field of human
endeavour as well as in the realm of the gods (which is much the same as in Pindar).
Indeed, events in general acquire their impetus both from the human and divine
spheres. The part played by the gods does not cancel out human ability. The one
cause does not eliminate the other. Nobody wins unless they deserve to, though
sometimes a more worthy contestant loses. But that is part of the interplay between
gods and men. In the end, Homer preserves the value of human activity, which is not
simply absorbed by the actions of the gods.
MORALITY AND SPORT
The gods. An enormous gulf separates the gods from human beings. The
gods have, to a supreme extent, those virtues and characteristics which people have
by repute. People have only what the gods deign to give them. As a whole, an
unfavourable turn of events, calamities and clouding of the mind are attributed partly to
the gods, to their adverse will, anger, envy and so on, but there is nevertheless more
than a hint of human responsibility, as well. On the other hand, human expectations for
deliverance from evil, for favourable treatment and social justice are also referred to
the gods.
In the field of sport, the gods do not favour a certain mortal on the basis of
moral criteria. Their will is the sole factor here. There is clear favouritism shown
towards the nobility in general and to certain members of it in particular. To the
aristocrat’s way of thinking, of course, divine favour implies that the favourite is in fact
worthy, that he excels, but excellence does not have any moral shade of meaning. I
would make the point that at roughly the same period of history, much more blatant
favouritism was attributed to God in the Old Testament, where He seems to ignore
completely the moral stature of His “chosen ones” and to favour on a permanent basis
adulterers, procurers, deceivers and those who commit incest, such as Abraham for
example, whom the sacred books present as a fraud, serial procurer and committer of
incest (Gen. 12, 11-16 and 20, 1-18).
I have already made the point that the favour of the gods among the Greeks
was always personal and never racial. In the Trojan War, the preferences of the gods
are quite clearly evenly divided between the Greeks and Trojans. And it is hardly to be
doubted that the same would, of course, apply in the case of sporting contests. I would
recall that Homer never speaks disparagingly of the Trojans, that he treats them as he
does the Greeks, and that perhaps the most likeable characters he created were
Priam (especially at the astounding closure of the Iliad) and Hector. I believe that this
is a paramount difference from other religions, which, with their intensely racial
character, may give rise to dangerous chauvinism.
People. There are some mythical contests, especially those which occurred as
the result of an inappropriately crude challenge and harsh constraint, sometimes à
l’outrance, which were very close to the spirit of war. In such contests, the value of
human life is secondary to that of victory. As ideas of morality slowly progressed, this
relationship was transformed, so that we arrive -from as early as Homer- at a
diametrically opposite view of moral values. First came the value of human life, and
thereafter that of victory. The stoppage of the armed combat in the Iliad, for fear that

21
one of the contestants might be killed, and its removal from the programme of the
Olympic Games are important testimony to the new morality.
In Homer, the institutions of common law apply in the field of sport, as they do
in the rest of life. Common law informed the sum total of the relations between
members of a family and their behaviour towards strangers, and therefore the whole of
their relations towards their fellow athletes, the organizers of the games and the
spectators fell within these terms.
The organization of an athletic contest involved: a) a cause; b) the actual
running of the games; c) confirmation of victory and the awarding of prizes. At each of
these stages, there were, of course, codes of behaviour, the observation of which was
the norm and the infringement of which raised problems of morality.
When games were organized purely for enjoyment, such as for the wedding of
a daughter or to honour some dead king or other, there were no moral problems at the
first stage. Things change, however, when games are organized on the basis of a
challenge. Even in Homer, a challenge was a means of inviting someone to a sporting
match. When this occurred within the limits of common decency and of the
permissible, it did not exclude rivalry in the best sense. But when the challenge was
issued in terms designed to insult honour or to threaten, then hostile relations might
result.
Homer graphically presents the two forms of challenge in an episode from the
games which took place on the island of the Phaeacians. One of the sons of Alcinous,
Laodamas, says to Odysseus: “I hope, Sir, that you will enter yourself for some one or
other of our competitions if you are skilled in any of them -and you must have gone in
for many a one before now. There is nothing that does any one so much credit all his
life long as the showing himself a proper man with his hands and feet. Have a try
therefore at something, and banish all sorrow from your mind”.
Laodamas, therefore, sees the games as a form of entertainment, not fierce
competition. His idea is that Odysseus will forget his troubles if he takes part. It is for
this reason that he is so polite in issuing his invitation. The challenge of his brother
Euryalus, on the other hand, is clearly insulting. He claims that Odysseus, who politely
refused Laodamas’ invitation, has no experience of games. This would have been
deeply wounding to the ears of an ancient aristocrat, since it was a common demand
that any man worth his salt, and especially an aristocrat, should be an athlete, just as
he should be a warrior. Euryalus even compares him with a profiteering and idle
merchant, who sits in his ship and does nothing, i.e. with precisely the sort of person
the aristocrats held in greatest contempt. All of this was an insult to the aristocratic
merit of Odysseus and could have had dire results. But Odysseus, who knows how to
restrain himself, praises Euryalus as being robust and of fine build, though he also
censures him as foolish and intemperate. And so a new requirement for athletes is put
forward: they are expected to be not merely sturdy and fine-looking, but also to have
discretion and facility of speech. They should also have αιδώς -dignified modesty- the
outstanding moral quality which was the opposite of hubris. The ability to speak
fluently -an intellectual rather than corporeal quality- and, in doing so, not to be
unnecessarily provocative was considered a gift of the gods. These verses
successfully encapsulate all the basic demands on a Homeric athlete. Power and
beauty were not of themselves sufficient, if intellectual and moral virtues were absent.
We have here the first indirect criticism of those athletes who cultivated their bodies
unilaterally, without concerning themselves equally about the spirit and morality. This
is a clear outline of the ideal of kalokagathia (beauty and virtue) which was to be a
basic requirement of later times. It is most curious that such a noteworthy passage has
so far escaped notice.
At one time, certain things needed to be agreed before any contest. These
agreements were made verbally: a man’s word was enough. Sometimes, however, an
oath had to be sworn to ensure that a term was adhered to. Odysseus asked the
spectators to swear not to intervene on the part of Irus, with whom he was about to

22
wrestle. The oath protected Odysseus from any possible abuse at the hands of the
spectators.
Let us see what happened during the contest itself. Each sport had its own
rules, which had to be kept. These rules were very well known which is why they were
not repeated before every contest. In mythical and Homeric sport, attention to the rules
and sporting behaviour in general were left to the conscience of the athletes
themselves, while in Olympic sport the athletes swore an oath before competing that
they would do so fairly. In practice, however, athletes did not always compete fairly
and honourably.
The best known method of breaking the rules was cheating, the history of
which goes back a very long way. Pelops tricked his way to victory over Oenomaus: he
persuaded the king’s charioteer to remove the spike from the wheel of the vehicle, so
that it would overturn. The strange thing is that this was a popular story. Similarly,
Hippomenes defeated Atalanta by cheating: he threw the golden apples of Aphrodite
at her feet and when she bent down to pick them up, she lost the race. Here, too, all
was well that ended well, since the cheating resulted in marriage. Let us examine more
carefully another equally well-known case of cheating, where we see for ourselves
exactly what happened.
In the funeral games for Patroclus, we see Nestor advising his son before the
chariot race. In this episode we see a number of strange things. Nestor, who was well-
known for his uprightness, advises his son to use his brain, to act cunningly, to make
use of circumstances and the psychology of his opponents. His son does as he is told,
takes a risk -though I do not understand why this was forbidden- and beats Menelaus,
who is very put out and accuses him of cheating. In other words, Nestor advised his
son to do things which were unacceptable in Homeric times.
Treachery was often presented as admitable in ancient times, especially in the
field of warfare. People such as Odysseus had the respect of others. Cunning and
deceit were often necessary for survival itself. Can we imagine Odysseus surviving the
various Laestrygones and Cyclops without treachery? In critical situations, the notion
of cleverness did not exclude deceit and treachery. Antilochus found himself in the
following situation. When the contest was announced, victory assumed vast
proportions in his mind. It became the greatest good and had to be won. He was a
skilful charioteer, as least as capable as his rivals. But his horses were slower. So he
was at a loss what to do. From the point of view of cold reason, he should have
abandoned the attempt and retired from the action, just as Odysseus ought to have let
himself be devoured by Cyclops, who was more powerful. He did not give up,
however, and, instead, looked for a way out of the impasse. The only solution was to
set his brain to work, to think of something or to await developments which were
favourable to him and not to his opponent.
Pelops had found himself in a similar impasse. For him, the greatest prize was
to win Hippodameia -otherwise he would not have risked his life. But Oenomaus had
swifter horses. Pelops therefore would have had to withdraw from the contest, though
this was his only hope of winning the girl. But this he did not do. Faced with
Oenomaus, a cruel and murderous opponent, who used the superiority of his horses to
be sure of killing the suitors of his daughter, Pelops did the only thing he could in order
to win: he cheated. In similar circumstances, many heroes would have done the same
thing and would not have been blamed for it. In the case of Antilochus, the discontent
was naturally on the part of Menelaus. On the other hand, nobody seems to have been
disconcerted and there were no objections when Odysseus defeated Telamonian Ajax
by cheating. No unwritten law seems to have condemned cunning outright. Would we
be right, however, to suppose from this that cunning was acceptable in all the
circumstances of life in Ancient Greece and not only in emergencies? If cunning is
applied without justification in all circumstances, then it destroys trust in human
relations, or rather it makes such relations impossible. We may suppose that the most
honourable and conscientiously moral among the Ancient Greeks would have

23
considered cunning necessary in the emergencies of life, without, however, condoning
it. Others, who were less morally sensitive, would have placed it among the morally
ambivalent things which exist in all ages. The most morally lax would have considered
it a virtue.
At the third stage of the games, the confirmation and acknowledgement of
victory, problems might arise if one of the athletes appealed against the result. It
appears that if someone felt wronged, he could demand that the victor should swear
on oath that he had competed fairly. In this way, a contest could begin with an oath
and end with one. But these were not compulsory; they were not included in the rules
of the contest. An oath at the beginning of a contest guaranteed certain moral
conditions, while fear of being made to swear an oath at the end limited the tendency
to cheat, insofar as this was possible.
PART TWO
OLYMPIC SPORTS
In the first Olympian Ode, Pindar, in a brilliant and magnificent image
compares water, which is, of course, best, with gold, which is “like a fire blazing in
the night”. And he goes on to say that the Olympic Games shine like the sun which
eclipses all the other stars. These verses express a concept that was already
generally accepted as early as the 6th
century BC.
Olympia, where the games were held, was not a city, but a locality sacred to
the Dorians. It was dedicated to Zeus, though Hera and other gods and heroes
were also worshipped there. From ancient times there had also been an oracle
there. At some point in history, traditionally 776 BC, this religious centre with its
splendid reputation, particularly among the Dorians, became established as a place
where games were held: foot-races at first, then other sports which were gradually
added later. These games were naturally endowed with the splendour transmitted
by the location and thus with borrowed glory. But since the games had their own
magnificence and attraction, the effects on the area must have been mutually
beneficial: the games took on the splendour of the oracle, but also added to its
renown, and therefore its income.
Of course, the oracle at Delphi, too, on the slopes of Parnassus, also
enjoyed tremendous standing, and that among all the Greeks, not merely the
Dorians. We would therefore have expected the Pythian Games to have had the
superiority and pride of place. But sporting contests were first added here in 582,
almost two centuries after the official opening of the Olympic Games, when the
Amphictyons (an organizing body) took over the organization of the venue. Their
model was the games in Olympia. People knew about the Olympic Games. It was
only later that they heard about the Pythian, the Isthmian and the Nemean Games.
Since the Olympic Games were the model, it is reasonable to refer to “Olympic
sports” when discussing the sum total of official games organized under the aegis
of religion. Of course, no one particular meaning is ruled out, but the context will
suffice which of these meanings is intended, the general or the particular.
In tandem with the official games, which were of a local or Panhellenic
character and were held at sacred locations, each city also had its stadia and
wrestling-schools to meet the demand for athletic activities. Young men trained
here on a daily basis -since sport was part of education- and it was here that
games were held, as we saw in the case of the island of the Phaeacans. All this
athletic activity, which was primarily of an educational nature and only secondarily
for enjoyment, I shall call “city gymnastics”. But gymnastics also prepared the
specialized athletes in their chosen discipline and therefore was a feeder for
Olympic sports. So the two must be examined together.

ANCIENT GREEK ATHLETICS.pdf.pdf

ANCIENT GREEK ATHLETICS.pdf.pdf

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