At Olympia, as at the Panathenaia in Athens and probably elsewhere, the first event preceding all others was the stade-race. Pausanias says that it was the oldest event at Olympia,[1403] and it existed there all through antiquity from the first recorded Olympiad ( = 776 B. C.), when Koroibos of Elis won.[1404] But the notion generally held[1405] that the stade-race for men was honored above all other events at Olympia, because the winner became ἐπώνυμος for the Olympiad and because his name occurs in the lists of Africanus for every Olympiad, is incorrect. In two passages Thukydides cites Olympic pancratiasts for dates,[1406] and in the earliest inscription which makes use of Olympiads for chronology the later introduced pankration is the event used.[1407] The literary supremacy of Athens, where, at the Panathenaia, the stade-race was the most important event, doubtless helped later in making the stade runner at Olympia eponymous. This custom, however, was not generally employed before the third century B. C.
Fig. 36.—Athletic Scenes from a Bacchic Amphora in Rome. A. Stadiodromoi and Leaper. B. Diskobolos and Akontistai.
Fig. 37.—Athletic Scenes from a Sixth-century B. C. Panathenaic Amphora. Stadiodromoi (left) and Dolichodromoi (right).
Pausanias dates the introduction of the double foot-race at Olympia in Ol. 14 ( = 724 B. C.).[1408] He does not say when the long race was instituted, but Eusebios says that it was in Ol. 15 ( = 720 B. C.).[1409] The boys’ stade-race was introduced there in Ol. 37 ( = 632 B. C.).[1410] The hoplite-race was inaugurated at the end of the sixth century B. C., in Ol. 65 ( = 520 B. C.).[1411] Pausanias mentions 24 stadiodromoi at Olympia, who won 32 victories, which makes this event third in importance, next after boxing and wrestling. He mentions 7 victors in the double race with 11 victories, and 5 victors in the long race with 8 victories. He also mentions 12 hoplite victors with 14 victories. Consequently, in all four running events there, he records 48 victors with 65 victories, which brings the running races only to second place in importance at Olympia, ranking next after boxing.[1412] The ordinary sprinter or stadiodromos, and the double sprinter, diaulodromos or hoplitodromos, naturally ran differently from the endurance runner or dolichodromos. Panathenaic vases clearly show this difference. Thus while the sprinter swung his arms violently, spreading the fingers apart and touching the ground only with his toes[1413] (Figs. 36A and 37, left), the endurance runner, who had to conserve his strength to the last, ran with a long stride, holding his arms bent at the elbow and close to the body, his fists doubled and his body slightly bent forward, its weight resting on the ball of the foot, the heel being raised only a little. Thus Philostratos says that the dolichodromoi ran with their hands extended and with their fists balled, but that at the finish they also swung their arms violently like wings.[1414] The race (showing balled fists) is seen on a Panathenaic amphora dating from the archonship of Nikeratos (333 B. C.), now in the British Museum, and on another of the sixth century B. C., pictured in Fig. [37] (right).[1415] In the diaulos the movement was less violent. Thus on an Athens vase inscribed, “I am a diaulos runner,”[1416] the movement is between that of a sprinter and an endurance runner. It seems probable that this difference in the style of running was similarly shown in sculpture.[1417] We shall next consider certain sculptural monuments which represent runners.
The typical scheme for archaic and archaistic art was to represent the runner with one knee nearly touching the ground, the upper log forming a right angle with the lower, the other leg being perpendicular to the upper. This scheme appears on many vases and reliefs and in statuettes and statues.[1418] This old method of depicting runners was kept up by vase-painters down to the time of the red-figured masters.[1419] We see them on many reliefs, e. g., on the Ionic-Greek reliefs on the three archaic bronze tripods of the middle of the sixth century B. C. in the possession of Mr. James Loeb;[1420] on a small bronze relief in the Metropolitan Museum in New York which represents a winged Boreas;[1421] and on the marble funerary stele of the so-called dying hoplite runner found in 1902 near the Theseion, and now in the National Museum in Athens.[1422] Almost the same position as that of the figure on this Athenian relief is seen in a small bronze in the Metropolitan Museum, whose primitive features and solidly massed hair date it in the early part of the sixth century B. C.[1423] Another slightly larger bronze in the same museum represents Herakles running in a kneeling posture.[1424] Because a spearman is incongruous behind a bowman, Kalkmann[1425] and Furtwaengler[1426] have interpreted the two kneeling figures near either end of the West gable of the temple on Aegina as archaic runners (see Fig. [21], left). We may further compare with these figures the positions, though not the motives, of two others from the West gable at Olympia,[1427] as well as that of the kneeling bowman Herakles from the East gable of the temple on Aegina.[1428] In this connection we shall also mention the life-size marble torso of a kneeling youth found in Nero’s villa at Subiaco in 1884 and now in the Museo delle Terme, Rome (Pl. [24]).[1429] This statue, representing a boy of delicate build apparently striding forward with the right leg and bending the left so that the knee nearly touches the ground, has been regarded by some scholars[1430] as a runner, whose pose copies the archaic manner, being historically the last example known of its use in sculpture. The right shoulder is turned backward and the head, now missing, was turned back and upwards; the right arm is raised high and twisted about with the palm of the hand facing backward, the left arm extended with its hand in some way related to the right knee. The impression made on the spectator is that of a boy bending aside as if to ward off some danger. It is an excellent piece of work, evidently the marble copy of an original bronze. This has been variously assigned to the fifth, fourth, and even later centuries B. C.,[1431] and interpreted in various ways[1432]—as a Niobid,[1433] as Ganymedes swooped down upon by the eagle,[1434] as Hylas drawn into the water by nymphs when he was filling his pitcher,[1435] as a ball-player,[1436] as a boy throwing a lasso,[1437] as a gable figure,[1438] as a runner at the games, etc. Many of these interpretations are purely fanciful; the last is, perhaps, as good as any, though the strongly turned upper body seems not quite fitted to it. If it represents a runner, the sculptor has reproduced the well-known archaic pose.