CHAPTER XXII
THE GYMNASIUM AND THE PALAESTRA
In Homeric times the gymnasium and the palaestra did not exist. The broad runs in Ithaca,[[795]] which are sometimes quoted as the prototype of the Greek gymnasia, were not running-tracks but cattle-runs. The need for special places for exercise first arose with the growth of city life. At first these were no more than open spaces in some grove or plain where the ground had been cleared for running or for wrestling. Such were the “runs and wrestling rings” which Cleisthenes of Sicyon prepared for his daughter’s suitors.[[796]] The place where the Spartan youth exercised retained its ancient name the “Dromos” or run, even in the time of Pausanias. The runs developed into the gymnasium, the wrestling-ring into the palaestra.
The word “gymnasium” means, properly, an athletic exercise. By a natural transference it comes to be used first in the plural, afterwards collectively in the singular for a place set apart for such exercises. It is a general term. The gymnasium is merely an athletic ground, or playing-field, where all sorts of sport take place. It contains “runs and wrestling-rings.” It may serve as a riding-school. Euripides speaks of “gymnasia resounding with the tramp of horses.”[[797]] It may contain buildings for the comfort of those who use it, but the essential part of the gymnasium is the running-ground. On the other hand, the palaestra is a special term for the wrestling-school. In its simplest form it is a square enclosure, containing some provision for undressing and washing. It is essentially a building. The palaestra may exist without a gymnasium, but no gymnasium can exist without a palaestra. Moreover, in a gymnasium the necessary buildings are naturally centred round the palaestra. Hence the palaestra being architecturally the most important part of the gymnasium, the two terms are in practice often used synonymously. Yet the original distinction is never wholly obliterated; in Pausanias the gymnasium is still the athletic ground, the palaestra the wrestling-school.[[798]]
Gymnasia probably existed in most Greek states in the sixth century or even earlier. Shade and water being essential for the comfort of those who used them, the site selected was usually a grove beside some stream outside the city. Such was the Platanistas at Sparta, an island formed by the windings of the river, and taking its name from the plane trees which surrounded it. Such were the three ancient gymnasia at Athens: the Academea, the Lyceum, and the Cynosarges. All three were sacred groves outside the walls of the city, the Academea on the west side, on the banks of the Cephisus, the other two on the east near the Eridanus and Ilissus. All three probably existed in the sixth century. The Academea was first enclosed with a wall by Hipparchus, and was afterwards improved by Cimon into a well-watered grove with trim avenues and walks. The origin of the Lyceum was variously ascribed to Peisistratus, Pericles, and Lycurgus. As it certainly existed in the time of Socrates, it was probably founded by Peisistratus, if not earlier, and underwent various improvements at the hands of Pericles and Lycurgus. The gymnasium of Cynosarges was reserved for bastards, and those whose parents were not both Athenian. Themistocles being the son of a Carian mother, and resenting his exclusion from the other gymnasia, succeeded in persuading some prominent young Athenians to accompany him to the Cynosarges. Slaves were not allowed to take any part in athletics, which were regarded as the distinctive mark of freeborn Greeks. The Academea and Lyceum were large enough to serve as riding-schools and parade-grounds for cavalry. The Athenian gymnasia were open to Athenians of all ages; boys were certainly not excluded, though, as we shall see, they were usually sent to the palaestra for education;[[799]] men of all ages resorted to them for their daily exercise; competitors for the games trained in them; above all, they were the training-school of the epheboi, at all events from the fifth century onwards. “When a boy is enrolled among the Epheboi,” says Socrates, in the Pseudo-Platonic dialogue called Axiochus,[[800]] “then come the Lyceum and the Academea, the rule of the gymnasiarchos, beatings with rods and ills innumerable.” Consequently, the gymnasia were the favourite resort of sophists and philosophers in search of pupils. Some philosophers habitually frequented certain gymnasia, which thereby became connected with particular schools of philosophy. In course of time literary studies prevailed over athletics, and the gymnasium developed into a sort of university.
The existence of palaestrae at Athens in the sixth century is attested by the speech of Aeschines against Timarchus. In this speech the orator refers to certain laws ascribed to Solon for the regulation of schools and palaestrae. The paidotribai were not to open the palaestrae before sunrise, and were to close them before sunset. There were regulations as to the class of boys to be admitted, their numbers and age, their discipline and the conduct of the Hermaea, a boy’s festival celebrated in the palaestrae. The actual text of the laws is spurious, but there is no reason for doubting the existence of the regulations mentioned by Aeschines, and their antiquity. But we must not confound the palaestrae referred to with those which formed part of the gymnasia. The latter were public institutions, mostly outside the city; the palaestrae for which Solon laid down regulations were such of the private palaestrae as were used for the physical education of boys. There were numerous private palaestrae, some perhaps built by rich individuals for their own use,[[801]] others kept by paidotribai[[802]] for profit. The publicity of the gymnasia and their remoteness rendered them unsuitable for the training of young boys. Parents and teachers naturally preferred the comparative privacy of the palaestra in the city. Some of these may have been attached to schools, others may have been reserved for boys of certain ages, or special times may have been reserved in them for different ages. Certainly it is at these palaestrae that the Athenian boys received their physical training. But it is no more correct to say that the palaestrae generally were reserved for the education of boys under the age of eighteen, than it is to say that no boys under that age were admitted to the gymnasia. Some of the palaestrae were certainly used by older pupils. In Plato’s Lysis the sophist Miccus is stated to have established himself in a newly built palaestra. Boys of different ages are trained there at different times, but the pupils of Miccus are not boys, but epheboi or grown-up men, and these at all events had free entry there at certain times. The fact is that there were palaestrae of various sorts just as there are schools and colleges of various sorts in England to-day. To treat all the palaestrae as similar, and to endeavour to lay down hard and fast rules for all alike, is as ridiculous as it would be to write a treatise on the schools of England in which no distinction was made between primary schools and secondary schools, or between a college which forms part of a university and a college which is really a school.
Our knowledge of Greek gymnasia down to the fourth century is practically confined to Athens. The earliest existing gymnasium is that of Delphi, which belongs to the fourth century. The gymnasium at Olympia cannot be earlier than the third century. The only contemporary evidence for the fifth century is derived from the vase-paintings which give a vivid picture of the life of the gymnasium at Athens in the first half of this century, but yield only fragmentary evidence as to the arrangements of the gymnasium. Yet this evidence agrees so well with the remains discovered at Olympia and Delphi, and also with such scattered allusions as we find in literature, especially in Plato’s dialogues, that we may feel sure that the gymnasia and palaestrae of the fifth century throughout Greece were substantially of the type which we find in these places.[[803]]
The essential parts of the gymnasium or palaestra are clearly stated in the treatise on the Athenian Republic,[[804]] which if not written by Xenophon was probably written in the second half of the fifth century. The writer, speaking of the progress of the Athenian democracy, says: “As for gymnasia and baths and undressing-rooms some rich people have their own, but the people have built for their own use many palaestrae, dressing-rooms, and bath-rooms, and the mob has far more advantages in these respects than the fortunate few.” In this passage we notice, first, that there is no real distinction between gymnasium and palaestra; if there is any distinction, it is merely that the palaestra is somewhat more elaborate than the gymnasium, as the bath-room is more than the bath. Both are merely places for exercise. Secondly, the dressing-rooms and bath-rooms are clearly not independent buildings, but are connected with the gymnasia. Bath-rooms might exist separately, but what would be the use of separate undressing-rooms? Every gymnasium and every palaestra must contain, besides the actual “runs and wrestling-rings,” some place where those who use them may undress and oil themselves before exercise, and may wash themselves afterwards. These are the three essential parts of every such building, and all the complicated arrangements of the gymnasia at Ephesus and Pergamum are merely elaborations of these three requirements.
The dialogues of Plato illustrate alike the similarity and difference in the arrangements of a gymnasium and palaestra. The scene of the Lysis is laid in the new-built palaestra to which reference has already been made. In general plan it resembles an ordinary one-storied Greek house. It is surrounded by a wall (περίβολος), the only opening in which is a door giving access to the street. Around this wall, on the inside, are placed the various rooms which all open out into the central court (αὐλή) which in the palaestra is considerably larger than in an ordinary house. On entering, the visitor finds himself in a sort of ante-chamber, from which he passes into a large hall called the apodyterion (ἀποδυτήριον). The front of this hall is open, so that it commands a view of the court, which is used for exercise. This hall, as its name denotes, is the undressing-room. But, like the modern cricket pavilion, it serves as a general meeting-place for all who frequent the palaestra. There are seats around the walls for their convenience. A group of boys are playing knuckle-bones when Socrates enters, and Socrates retreats to the farther corner to find a seat. Probably, if there were no other rooms, it was in the apodyterion that Miccus used to hold his classes. There may, of course, have been other rooms around the court, certainly there must have been some accommodation for washing, but as the bath-room is not conducive to serious conversation it naturally plays no part in these dialogues.
Now let us pass on to the Lyceum gymnasium.[[805]] The arrangement is similar, but on a larger scale. Close to the entrance is the apodyterion where Socrates takes his seat and watches people come and go. But besides the court, there is a covered track (κατάστεγος δρόμος), probably a colonnade running round one or more of the four sides of the court. This covered dromos is the place where Athenian gentlemen take their daily constitutional. As Socrates is waiting, two such enter, take two or three turns in this dromos, and then return to the apodyterion. Acumenos[[806]] indeed recommends a walk in the country as less fatiguing, but the gymnasium is a more sociable place, there is more life and amusement to be found there, and so the Athenian prefers it. But these covered runs are not for athletes or epheboi except in the worst of weather. For them tracks are provided in the park outside (ὁ ἔξω δρόμος) where, as in the Academy, they may run races “mid a fragrance of smilax, and leisure, and white poplar in the spring-season when the plane tree whispers to the elm.”[[807]]
The pictures on the red-figured vases enable us to fill in these outlines. These vases, manufactured mostly at Athens, between the years 520 and 440 B.C., represent the life of the Athenian epheboi, that is to say, life in the public gymnasia. On them we see scenes from the gymnasia proper, where youths are exercising, scenes from the apodyterion, and scenes from the bath-room.