Fig. 151. R.-f. kylix. British Museum, E. 78.
Modern writers turn up their eyes in holy horror at the brutality of the pankration, and marvel that a race so refined as the Greeks could have tolerated so brutal a sport. Undoubtedly the pankration might degenerate into brutality, and perhaps sometimes actually did. So may football, boxing, wrestling, unless they are controlled by rules, and unless the rules are enforced. But the pankration was controlled by rules, and the rules were enforced in the wrestling school and in the games by trainers and officials under public control, and enforced with the rod in a practical way which the modern umpire or referee may well envy, and the rod was certainly not spared. Further, the rules were enforced by a public opinion and tradition that in the best times certainly placed skill and grace far above brute strength in all athletics. No branch of athletics was more popular than the pankration. Philostratus describes it as the fairest of all contests.[[742]] Mythology ascribed its invention to Heracles and Theseus,[[743]] the typical representatives of science as opposed to brute strength. What the pankration was in the fifth century we can learn from Pindar. No less than eight of his odes are in praise of pankratiasts, and from these odes can be illustrated every feature of the poet’s athletic ideal. There was, of course, an element of danger, but danger does not make a sport brutal. Serious injuries, even loss of life, sometimes occurred, but these accidents were rare, rarer probably than in football or in the hunting-field, and the Greeks certainly regarded the pankration as less dangerous than boxing.[[744]] Finally, the example of jiujitzu proves that such contests may be conducted without any brutality as contests of pure skill.
The fullest account of the pankration occurs in Philostratus’ description of the death of Arrhichion, a famous pankratiast of the sixth century, who expired at the very moment when his opponent acknowledged himself beaten.[[745]] After describing the scene and the excitement of the spectators, Philostratus adds a characteristic account of the pankration. “Pankratiasts,” he says, “practise a hazardous style of wrestling (κεκινδυνευμένῃ τῇ πάλη). They must employ falls backward (ὑπτιασμῶν) which are not safe for the wrestler, and grips in which victory must be obtained by falling (οἷον πίπτοντα). They must have skill in various methods of strangling (ἄνχειν); they must also wrestle with an opponent's ankle (σφυρῷ προσπαλαίουσι) and twist his arm (στρεβλοῦσι), besides hitting and jumping on him, for all these practices belong to the pankration, only biting and gouging (ὀρύττειν) being excepted. The Spartans admit even these practices, but the Eleans and the laws of the games exclude them, though they commend strangling.”
It would be difficult to give a more concise description. Wrestling, hitting, and kicking are employed; the style of wrestling is hazardous; victory is usually obtained by strangling; biting and gouging are alone prohibited. The prohibition of gouging and biting is evidently a quotation from the actual rules of Olympia. It is twice quoted by Aristophanes.[[746]] Biting needs no comment. The meaning of the word translated “gouging” is clear from Aristophanes. It means digging the hand or fingers into the eyes, mouth, and other tender parts of the body. A vivid illustration of “gouging” occurs on a British Museum kylix (Fig. [151]). One of the pankratiasts has inserted his thumb and finger into his opponent’s eye as if to gouge it out, and the official is hastening up with his rod uplifted to interfere and punish such foul play. A somewhat similar scene is represented on a kylix in Baltimore (Fig. [152]), where a pankratiast inserts his thumb into the mouth of an opponent whom he has thrown head over heels.
Fig. 152. R.-f. kylix. Baltimore.
Fig. 153. R.-f. kylix. Berlin.
The pankration naturally divides itself into two parts, the standing pankration (τὸ ἄνω παγκράτιον) and the struggle on the ground (τὸ κάτω παγκράτιον). In the former the opponents endeavoured to throw one another heavily to the ground, by wrestling or kicking or hitting. There was much preliminary sparring, appropriately described as ἀκροχειρισμίς.[[747]] The hands were unprotected by thongs or other covering, and, as is natural in a combination of wrestling and boxing, the open hand and the fist were both used. Both are represented on the fragment of a kylix in Berlin (Fig. [153]). The fallen youth bleeds freely from the nose, and bears on his back the imprint of his opponent’s fingers. At the same time, his fist is clenched ready to strike. The relative importance of wrestling and boxing in the pankration depended much on the individual. The man with a long reach naturally preferred to utilize his advantage in hitting; the short, thickset boxer generally depended for victory on his wrestling.[[748]] The struggle was usually decided on the ground. It is commonly stated that when one or other opponent had fallen, hitting was no longer allowed. This purely modern idea is conclusively disproved by such vases as the one just quoted. Neither in boxing nor in the pankration was it forbidden to strike a man who was down. As a rule, when both men were down hitting was of little use, and the contest was usually decided by wrestling, especially by twisting a limb, or by strangling. If, however, one opponent had been knocked down by a heavy blow, he was usually at his opponent’s mercy, and he commonly holds up his hand in sign of defeat, or else the official is represented interfering to stop the contest.
The epithet “hazardous” by which Philostratus characterizes the wrestling of the pankration is appropriate to such throws as “the flying mare” and the various foot and leg holds which, though too risky for the wrestler proper, were freely employed in the pankration, where it was not sufficient only to throw an opponent, but he must be thrown heavily. The use of the flying mare is illustrated on the Baltimore kylix (Fig. [152]), where the left-hand wrestler proceeds to pummel his fallen opponent. A much mutilated group on the kylix illustrated in Fig. [54] represents a throw from a leg-hold. A wrestler kneeling on one knee has seized his opponent between the legs and lifts him up, bending forwards as if to hurl him on to the ground. The scene is described by Anacharsis in Lucian.[[749]] “Look,” he cries, “that fellow has picked up the other by the legs and flung him to the ground, and falling on him, will not suffer him to rise, but forces him into the mud, and at last, winding his legs round his stomach, with his arm placed under his throat, he strangles the poor wretch.”