Athletics and Games of the Ancient Greeks

by Edward M. Plummer

During these six years a space in the form of a square, measuring 1,000 feet on each side, was stripped of the accumulated deposit of twelve centuries; the average depth of this covering was estimated to be over sixteen feet.

Archæologically, this excavation involved expert care and much labor. Neither the care nor the labor was withheld. The result may best be described in the language of an eminent professor of classical archæology:—

“The result of these excavations, carried on there at great cost and with supreme disinterestedness by the German people, has been to enable the traveller at Olympia not only to study the scene of the greatest of Greek athletic festivals, but to trace the celebration from hour to hour and from point to point. He not only sees the hill of Cronion, where the spectators crowded, wades through Olympic dust, and feels the sun of Olympia beat on his head, but he can wander on the threshold of the temple of Zeus, pass from building to building in the sacred enclosure of the Altis, and stand at the starting-point of the runners in the Stadium. Taking the guidebook of the old Greek traveller Pausanias in our hand, we can follow in his steps, and out of broken pillars, truncated pedestals and the foundations of demolished buildings, we can conjure forth the beautiful Olympia of old, with its glorious temples, its rows of altars, its statues of gods and godlike men who conquered in the games, its treasuries full of the noblest works of art and the richest spoils of war. And we can people the solitude with the combatants and with the spectators, a crowd filled with the enthusiasm of the place and with delight in manly contests; a crowd over whom emotions swept as rapidly as chariots through the hippodrome, and who were ever breaking out into wild cries of delight, or loud shouts of scorn and derision. We can see the bestowal of the crowns of wild olive, and can hear the heralds recite the names of those who have been victorious.”

Here, then, in the summer time was held the great athletic festival in honor of Olympian Zeus. At the beginning of authentic history it was already a venerable institution. We have already learned that early in the sixth century the other three Panhellenic festivals were modeled upon it. Many myths very early sprang into existence to explain its origin. Pindar, it is well known, in one of his Olympian odes makes the Dorian Herakles the founder. Of course, the myths do not agree, and if they did would establish nothing directly; indirectly, however, they show that at the time of their first promulgation the festival had attained so approved a system, so wide a celebrity, and so great a prestige as to need accounting for and to be compatible with an exalted origin. And as a matter of fact, system, celebrity and prestige do not fall to the lot of an institution in the period of a single generation.

The festival was from the first under the charge of the Eleians. But so liberal a policy did this nation adopt and pursue that people from neighboring states were glad to send competitors. Rapidly the custom of resorting to the games spread to more distant states. From an Eleian event, the festival became Peloponnesian, and finally Panhellenic. The Athenians and Thebans at a very early date achieved splendid victories in these games. The Theban Pagondas was crowned victor in the four-horse chariot race in the 25th Olympiad, when for the first time this was a feature of the festival. Thus one state after another turned its attention to the venerable celebration, and if it happened that a citizen of one state was crowned victor in a contest, interest in the games was sure to be increased in that locality.

Even in the absence of positive evidence it would be contrary to reason to suppose that the games were originally established as they existed at the time of Pindar. In fact, the different features were added successively. According to a fairly reliable tradition, there was originally and for twelve following Olympiads only one contest: the δρόμος, a foot-race consisting of a single lap of a stadion of two hundred yards. About 720 B. C., according to the tradition, was added the δίαυλος, a race in which the stadion was traversed twice. Soon afterward was added the δόλιχος, or long race, consisting of seven, then of twelve and perhaps twenty-four laps. The next contest to be introduced was the wrestling-match. In the same year that wrestling was introduced, about the 18th Olympiad, the pentathlon made its appearance. This feature, though consisting of five contests—leaping, spear-throwing, diskos-pitching, running and wrestling—was nevertheless a single event, inasmuch as victory in one contest alone was not rewarded; an athlete to be crowned victor in the pentathlon must win at least three of the contests. Boxing and the chariot race are said to have been added in the 23d Olympiad. Thus the games grew more elaborate, and the time over which they extended was increased from a single day to five or six.

The festival was conducted by judges, called Hellanodikai, elected by the people of Elis a year beforehand. The number of these judges was about ten; they were expected to give close attention to their duties. Thirty days before the festival, candidates for the various contests presented themselves before the Hellanodikai for examination. In order that the name of a candidate could be considered, he must prove himself to be of pure Hellenic stock, and must give evidence of having practised in a gymnasium for ten months previously; finally, the candidate must practise for thirty days in the great gymnasium of Elis, under the supervision of the Hellanodikai. The names of those who were able to satisfy the judges were placed on a white board which was exposed to view at Olympia. After an athlete had been entered for a contest, it was considered the greatest ignominy for him to withdraw for any reason; indeed, for so doing he was heavily fined. Theagenes, an athlete of wide fame, was unable to enter the pankration because he had been disabled in the boxing-match; but inasmuch as he had had his name entered for both events, he was fined.

Eleven days before the festival, the Hellanodikai caused to be proclaimed by heralds throughout all the cities of Hellas the truce, sacred to Olympian Zeus, which was to last a month. It was this truce that made the Olympia possible as a Panhellenic institution. During the month that followed the proclamations of the heralds, all wars between Hellenic states were held in abeyance, and travellers were allowed to journey through them unmolested. The awful name of Zeus coupled with the decrees of rulers made this truce effective.

During the eleven days pilgrims from all over Hellas were approaching Olympia. Some of the scenes may be imagined. In the language of Professor Percy Gardner: “From all the shores of the Mediterranean and the Euxine seas the Greek colonies sent deputations to represent them at the games, to bear offerings to the temple, and to perform sacrifices on their behalf. And the Greeks readily took a tinge from the land wherein they dwelt. There were dwellers on the northern shore of the Black Sea, to whom continual intercourse and frequent intermarriage with their Scythian neighbors gave almost the aspect of nomads; and colonists from Massilia, who in dress and blood were half Gauls. There were people from Cyrene, with the hot blood and dark complexions of Africa, and oriental Ionians, with trailing robes and effeminate airs. There were rude pirates from Acarnania, and delicate sensualists from Cyprus.”

To give a detailed account of the competitions at each of the great festivals would involve much unnecessary repetition. That held at Olympia, therefore, may be taken as the type and the ideal of the others. But even at Olympia, the celebrations of which have been most widely written of both by ancient and modern scholars, it is not always easy to determine the exact order of the various contests.