CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE
THE ANCIENT OLYMPIC GAMES
\\
AS POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT
A thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the
requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in
Theatre
by
Jay Ross Waddill
_-·
June, 1980
The Thesis of Jay Ross Waddill is approved:
Albert R. Baca
Heinrich R. Falk, Chairman
California State University, California
ii
I would like to thank Dr. Heinrich R. Falk for his
invaluable advice and assistance throughout the preparation
of the thesis and also his supportive enthusiasm and patience.
iii
,..
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
ABSTRACT
vi
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
1
CHAPTER II
ATHLETICS AND GREEK SOCIETY
6
Greek Ideal
6
The Polis and Panhellenism
8
Athletics and Everyday Life
13
CHAPTER III
ATHLETICS AND RELIGION
22
Athletics and Funeral Ritual
24
Festivals
26
The Rustic Dionysia
30
The Greater Dionysia
31
The Greater Panathenaia
32
CHAPTER IV
THE OLYMPIC GAMES
38
Origin of the Olympic Festival
History
~nd
39
Description of the Olympic
Festival
46
CHAPTER V
POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT AND THE OLYMPIC GAM.ES
Popular Entertainment
iv
58
58
PAGE
'l'he Athlete/Performer
61
·~pectators/Audience_
70
· Events/Perfo:rmance
77
CHAPTER VI
CONCLUSION
88
NOTES
96
BIBLIOGRAPHY
108
v
ABSTRACT
'I'HE ANCIENT OLYMPIC GAl-lES
AS POPULAR EN'rERTAINMENT
by
Jay Ross Waddill
Master of Arts in Theatre
Many aspects of ancient Greek culture have influenced
the development of Western civilization.
None of these
was more important to the ancient Greeks than t.he Olympic
Games.
Historians have suggested that the Olympic festi-
val may possibly have had its origins in a religious
ritual, the funerary commemoration of a local hero, a new
year's celebration, or an expression of military prowess
and readiness.
The purpose of this thesis is to analyze
the Olympic Games as a form of popular entertainment.
This analysis does not preclude the possibility that other
purposes may also have been served by the games.
In order to analyze this festival from the perspective
vi
of popular entertainment it is necessary to begin with
a discussion of athletics in general, and specifically
the Olympic Games as they functioned within the social
context of their times.
The philosophical ideal of bal-
ance between intellectual and physical powers made athletic training popular in Greek society and it made up
a major portion of the Greek's educational and recreational efforts.
Athletics were also important to each of the
individual city-states as competitions bet•,veen them confirmed their individuality and autonomy while at the same
time expressing the unity among all of the Greeks.
The relationship of athletic competitions to Greek
religion is then discussed.
This includes funeral cere-
monies and several athletic and non-athletic festivals
which were representative of some Greek religious practices.
These festivals were the Rustic Dionysia, the
Greater Dionysia, and the Panathenaia.
The various mytho-
logical and historical explanations of the festival's
origins and original functions are summarized.
A brief
history of the Olympic Games, their evolution, and a
description of the events that occurred there are also
provided.
The final phase of the thesis is the analysis of the
Olympic Games as a form of popular entertainment.
The
festival is studied from the perspective of its three
vii
primary elements--the spectators/audience, the athletes/
performers, and the athletic events/performance--each of
which is then subjected to a detailed analysis in order to
discover and describe the ways in which each element
functioned as entertainment.
Finally, the theatrical and
dramatic possibilities inherent in athletics and athletic
competitions are discussed.
viii
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
In ancient Greece a festival consisting primarily of
athletic competitions occurred every four years and was
known as the Olympic Games.
This festival was held regu-
larly for nearly twelve hundred years--·the dates that are
given for its period of existence are 776 B.C. to 394 A.D.
when the festival was banned by the Romans.
1
776 B.C. is
the year in which the first recorded victory occurred, but
historians believe that the festival was probably in existence for several centuries before this time. 2
Western civilization owes much of its form and character to the influence of ancient Greek culture.
In many
areas--sculpture, painting, poetry, drama 1 architecture
and philosophy, and the fields of science, medicine, mathematics, and politics--the works of the ancient Greeks
have been taken as examples and models upon which to base
new thought and learning.
All of Greek culture has been
seen as_worthy of intense study, but to the ancient Greek
himself there was little in his culture that was of greater
importance than the Olympic Games.
Festivals of all sorts
were extremely important to the Greek people, and their
calendar was filled with them and even defined by them.
The athletic festival at Olympia was probably the most
important and popular festival of them all.
1
Alexander the
2
Great considered Olympia the "capitol of the Greek world."
3
This festival was either directly mentioned or alluded to
by almost every ancient poet, philosopher, or hlstorian.
Homer described athletic competitions very much like the
ones at Olympia, suggesting that such games may have existed as early as the lOth century B.C.
4
Pindar dedicated an
entire volume of odes to the celebration of Olympic
victors.
5
An abundance of potshards decorated with scenes
depicting the exploits of Olympic athletes have been uncovered, and Olympic victors were not only seen. as models
for countless sculptures and of the Greek concept of a
physical ideal, but were often nearly mythologized and
were made the subjects of cult worship.
There were several factors that each added to the
festival's importance and popularity.
In addition to the
£estival's geographical position--the central location of
Olympia provided easy access for the entire Greek world-"its ancient sanctity, the athletic vigour of the preDorian Greeks, the discipline and training of the Spartans,
the enthusiastic patriotism of the colonies, the ambition
of tyrants," as well as the "new spirit of democracy" have
been listed as significant to the Olympic Games.
6
The
festival drew spectators and participants from all over the
Greek world.
Although there are no extant records that
reveal exactly how many spectators were actually in attendance, architectural evidence suggests that seating or
3
standing room was provided to accomodate between 45,000
and 50,000 spectators.
7
The Olympic Games, and the other
festivals that were modeled after them, are sometimes credited as being the only things that were ever capable of
unifying Greece, if only for short periods of time.
Dur-
ing the month in which the Olympic Games took place, even
in wartime, a truce was enacted throughout Greece,
~nd 1 any
man of pure Greek birth whether he was a participant or
merely a spectator, was guaranteed a safe passage to and
from the Games.
A violation of this sacred truce was
considered more than just a breach of the law, it was a
·~
8
sacrl.Lege.
Modern historians have suggested several possible
explanations of the Olympic Games' original purposes and
functions.
These explanations vary greatly stating that
this festival was perhaps a purely religious ceremony, 9 or
a funerary commemoration of a local hero,
of
the new year,
11
10
.
or poss1. bl y an express1on
a celebration
+=
o~
m1• 1"1tary
training and the exhibition of military prowess and readiness.12
All of these explanations concerning the festi-
val's religious and civic functions have undergone intensive study, gained acceptance by many scholars, and, as
the Olmpic festival was a complex event, are probably true
to some extent.
But in addition to these, there also
existed another aspect that helped to ensure the festival's
long continuing appeal and importance.
In view of the
vast numbers of spectators that attended the festival
throughout its long history, it can be assumed the ancient
Olympic Games were also an important form of popular
entertainment.
It is the purpose of this thesis to analyze this
festival as a form of popular entertainment.
The three
major elements of this festival will be examined:
the
athletes, the spectators, and the sporting events.
The
analysis of these three elements follows methodology that
will be explained in more detail in chapter V.
After
analyzing these three elements, an assess1nent will be made
to determine how these elements functioned to make the
Olympic Games a form of popular entertainment.
It is necessary to understand how the Olympic Games
and Greek athletics in general functioned within the context of ancient Greek Society in order to analyze them as
a form of popular entertainment.
Thus, the first portion
of this thesis is a historical study of those aspects of
ancient Greek social and religious life that may have had
some influence upon, or may possibly have been influenced
by, the Olympic Games.
Athletics, competitions, and
athlet.ic festivals were such an integral and important part
of the everyday life of the ancient Greeks that the Olympic
Games must be examined in this broader social context.
The
Olympic festival was the synthesis of many aspects of Greek
thought, and a study of these will
provide the objective
data upon which the analysis of the Olympic Games as a
form of popular entertainment can be based.
CHAP'l'ER II
ATHLETICS AND GREEK SOCIETY
The role that athletics played in the everyday life
and thought of the Greek people was an important one and
was reflected in many aspects of that society.
The word
"a-thletics" is derived from the Greek word athlonJ meaning
a prize given in a contest or the contest itself.
1
The
natural competitive spirit of the Greeks cannot be overemphasized.
No people has ever been so fond of competition. Competition entered into every
department cf their lives. They had competitions in music, drama, ;:;oetry, art,
even beauty competitions.2
And, of course, they held competitions in athletics.
But
whether expressed as competitions or as physical training
and exercise, athletics influenced, and were influenced by,
the society in which they existed.
Greek Ideal
One of the most important aspects of Greek thought in
a large way responsible for the existence and popularity of
physical training and athletic competition, was the Greek
concept of the ideal man.
That is, a man possessing equal
portions of intellectual ability and physical beauty and
prowess.
The Greek made physical training an important
6
7
part of his education because "it could never occur to him
to train anything but the whole
'1
man."~
The ancient Greek
ideal consisted not only of a balance between mental and
physical abilities but required these to be augmented with
the performance of noble deeds and required a noble birth.
It was only the aristocracy that could really fulfill this
ideal.
Pindar shows us the Hellenic ideal of an
aristocracy of race in the hour of its
noblest transfiguration, when, after centuries of glory extending from the mythical past to the hard modernity of the
fifth century, the nobility could still
draw the gaze of all Greece upo~ its exploits at the games at Olympia. 4
It has been said that the worship of health, beauty, and
strength was the true religion of the ancient Greeks. 5
The celebration of the human form and physical beauty,
both male and female, was seen all throughout Greek art.
The depiction of the ideal male, be it in sculpture, earthenware decoration, or any other art form, was, for the most
part, of the nude athlete.
There were also many depictions
of mythical and military heroes, but these were usually
seen in battle dress or traditional costumes and did not
represent any physical ideal.
It was the athlete that was
the model for the physical ideal.
It has been suggested
that athletics played a role, even if somewhat indirectly,
in the development of Greek art.
Athletic training grounds
8
existed in almost every city in ancient Greece.
Here the
athletes always trained totally naked, and artists who had
access to these training grounds used this opportunity to
observe the un-selfconscious athletes and study the human
anatomy in a limitless variety of natural poses. 6
The Greek ideal, at least in its early years, had its
highest form of expression in the Olympic Games and in the
Olympic victor.
The ancient Greeks looked upon the human
body and soul, raised to the perfection necessary for any
Olympic victory, as far beyond normal, worldly powers and
reaching to the heights of divinity.
The hymnal form was transferred from the
service of the gods to the glorification
of men ... Such exaltation was of course
impossible except for men of semi-divine
majesty, such as Olympic victors.7
The Polis and Panhellenism
Athletics certainly played a major part in the attempt
to fulfill the Greek ideal, but it also served several more
practical and historically significant functions.
One of
the most unique developments of ancient Greek culture was
the polis, and athletics was to prove very important to the
polis. When the Greeks first arrived out of the north, they
settled in small villages, or sometimes groups of villages,
each under the rule of its local chief. 8
The population
was organized into tribes with social levels based primar-
9
ily upon kinship and territorial holdings.
It was from
these old and powerful landowning families that the rulers
or chiefs of the poleis came.
9
In its earliest manifestation, the polis was an advanced form of tribalism, but it developed into what was
usually referred to as a "city-state".
generally a walled city.
The polis was
It provided protection for the
large part of the polis' population who were involved with
agriculture, and thus worked and probably lived outside of
the city walls.
The territory of the polis was delineated
by the physical topography of the Grecian landscape.
A
land so divided by mountains, valleys, plains, peninsulas
and islands quite naturally isolated certain groups of
people.
Every polis was entirely independent of the others,
each having
d~fferent
constitutions, laws, ways of life,
means of defense, and different ways of speaking the same
language and worshipping the same gods.
Although each
polis had its own autonomous government and its own political philosophy, they were all linked linguistically and
religiously.
The polis was small in population, but the
Greeks considered this smallness a necessary requisite for
remaining independent.
They felt that large states, such
as the Persian Empire, were only suitable for barbarians,
barbarian being a derisive lable for anyone who did not
speak Greek.
Each polis' smallness and autonomy probably
10
made Greek unification impossible and the lack of unity is
usually cited as the primary reason for the downfall of
Greek civilization.
However, this very smallness and
autonomy made it possible to make a bold political experiment: self rule and democracy.
The Greeks were unique in that they were not ruled by
a hereditary monarchy.
However, all of the members of the
polis did not share the same political privilege.
Life was
still mainly agricultural and aristocratic landowners held
all political power.
and decided policy.
ness of the wealthy.
They made the laws, judged disputes,
Self government was solely the busiBut this was soon to change as
their city-states were so diminutive and
the citizens lived so close to the centre
of governments that they soon grew dissatisfied with the blundering of their monarchs.
So one after another these monarchies were
suppressed; and the members of each citystate undertook the adventurous task of
governing themselves.lO
By the 6th century, most poleis were either true democracies or oligarchies, and the citizen usually had some
say, or at least some representation, in the governing of
his polis.
This made him extremely proud and intensely
patriotic.
He would do anything for his polis including
going to war and dying for it, which in fact he was often
called upon to do.
Although most poleis were small, at least in popula-
ll
tion, several surpassed the rest in both stature and
importance.
The Greeks themselves recognized Athens and
Sparta as being of greater importance than any of the
others.
These two may have been examples for all the rest
of Greece, but they were always in fierce competition with
each other.
The Peloponnesian War, a conflict between
aristocratic Sparta and democratic Athens, lasted from 431
B.C. to 404 B.C. with only occasional cessations of
hostilities.
In the midst of all this competition and local pride
and patriotism, there also existed, paradoxically, the
nearly opposite concept of Panhellensim--the idea that
all of the poleis from the whole of Greece, without relinquishing their independence and sovereignty, could exist as
a single, unified Greece.
At the height of Greek civiliza-
tion, poleis ranged from the western Mediterranean to the
coast of the Levant, and from the Black Sea to North
Africa.
All of the people from these poleis regarded
themselves as Greeks.
The historian Herodotus, after
studying anthropology, claimed there were four requisite
elements for anyone to be considered a true Greek.
were common descent, language, religion and culture.
These
11
All
of the Greeks were conscious of these criteria which they
readily called to mind whenever they wished to stress their
essential unity and their difference from foreigners. 12
It was not often that the Greeks actually wished to
12
~stress
their essential unity.
The concept of Panhellenism
was always held dear, especially to historians,
philoso~
phers; and politicians, but in practice it was rarely seen ..
Historians have traditionally cited only two periods when
the Greek world was, in reality, unified.
These were dur-
ing the Trojan War, around 1200 B.C., and the Persian Wars
in the fifth century.
But Kathleen Freeman refutes even
this, claiming that any action which could be seen as
evidence of a Greek unification was merely the result of
the individual polis instinct for self-preservation and
that, "the moment the immediate peril was relaxed they
returned to the expression of their mutual enmity."
13
Throughout the history of Greece, the neighboring poleis
formed many alliances and leagues for their mutual protection, but these were all short-lived and did little to
unify the whole body of the Greek people.
Panhellenism existed, primarily as an ideal concept,
but there were certain places and events that were sacred
to all Greeks.
Their common religion was revealed not only
in the names and characteristics of the
Olympian gods, but in the existence of
shrines, like those of zeus at Olymp1a and
Apollo at Delphi, where Greeks from all
parts joined in sacrifices and games and
forgot local difference in a consciousness
of Hellenic unity.l4
It has been said that ''religion failed to unify Greece, but
13
.
. d.1ca 11 y--succee d e d . " 15
athlet1cs--per1o
'rhere were four
athletic festivals that were considered important enough
throughout the whole Greek world to be called Panhellenic.
These were the Isthmian Garnes at Corinth, the Nernean Garnes
at Nernea, the Pythian Garnes at Delphi, and, the oldest and
most important, the Olympic Garnes at Olympia.
At these
athletic fesitvals, both the ideas of the independent polis
and Panhellenic unity found expression.
Each individual
polis was pitted in direct competition with the other
poleis, but only freeborn pure Greeks were allowed to cornpete.
And despite the fierce competitiveness between each
polis
before and after the actual athletic events, they
all worshipped the same gods as a unified body of Greeks.
Athlet~cs
and Everyday Life
With the growing trend of mercantilism, the polis,
especially cosmopolitan Athens, grew in size and population.
It was generally the wealthier businessman, in-
valved in trade and the importing and exporting of goods,
that lived within the walls of the city, while the peasant
farmer remained on the lands outside.
Here he went about
the business of agriculture, which was still the basis of
the city's economy.
Because of the growth of business
within the city, there developed a class of nonagricultural
wage earners.
A social class structure emerged that was
based upon economic levels rather than hereditary
14
background.
In Athens there were four classes based on
economic levels alone.
Added to these were the Metics,
or freeborn foreigners, living and working in Athens, and
an enormous population of slaves.
Of course the old
aristocratic families still existed and retained much of
their power, but there was now a chance for the freeborn
Greek citizen to better himself and his social position.
A feature of this urbanization that is rarely seen in a
purely agrarian culture, owing in part to its relentless
chronological demands, is leisure time.
Most of the Greeks
that resided in the poleis treasured their leisure time
and would take advantage of it even if it meant earning
less money at their wage paying occupations.
that was
11
Greek." 16
An existence
all work and no play had no attraction for the
Thus, the ancient Greeks devised many forms of
recreation and play to fill their spare time.
The elderly
and the infirm played quiet games of dice and draughts, or
they watched and surely wagered on cock or pheasant fights.
They had the time for leisurely strolls through the city
where they chatted with old friends and generally enjoyed
their later years.
The wealthy citizens kept stables of
fine horses which they bred and raced.
Hunting and fishing
for recreation were extremely popular, as were running,
swimming, horseback riding, music and dancing.
Young boys partook of a vast number of pastimes and
games.
Some of these games were intellectual but most
.l
15
were athletic, including a variety of ball games and
hockey-like team sports.
play.
Children busied themselves with
Plato, in his Laws, stated that he believed that
children should be allowed to play unrestricted until the
age of six, although their games should be given a gentle
nudge in the direction of some future trade or profession.17
The Greek child had numerous forms of toys to
keep him occupied.
He had rattles as an infant, and later
he had tops, hoops, whirlygigs, go-carts, kites, swings,
dolls, carved animals, seesaws, miniature bows and arrows,
and swords and shields.
To keep him company, he kept live
animals and birds.
At six, the boy's education began.
(Girls were rarely
educated outside of the home, though this was not the case
in Sparta, as will be shown later.
They were taught only
the domestic skills that they would need when they married.)
Legally, education was not forced by the state, but
custom and tradition made it nearly compulsory.
According
to Plato, the law did require a father to teach his sons
a trade, as well as music and gymnastics.
Another law,
credited to Solon, required all boys to learn to swim and
to know their letters.
18
The state not only stopped short of making education
mandatory, but also did not support it financially.
All
expenses were the responsibility of the child's parents,
and although Athenian democracy allowed all economic
16
classes of freeborn Greeks to attend school, the poorer
children usually were forced to leave school at an early
age.
Thus, education, including physical training, became
the venue of the aristocratic and the wealthy.
Surpris-
ingly, by the fifth century B.C., the general literacy
in Athens was very high.
It was the school master who directly received payment
from each boy's parents, but teachers remained very low
on the economic scale.
Education was divided into three
parts, each being of equal importance and considered
equally difficult.
Each phase of education had its own
specialized instructor.
The first was the grammatistes.
He taught the basics--arithmetic, reading,. and writing.
These were all difficult, owing to the complexities of the
ancient Greek language and the primitive state of mathematic knowledge that was available at the time--the fingers
were the only tools of calculation the Greeks used.
kitharistes taught music.
The
He taught not only choral sing-
ing and dance, but the mastery of a large number of musical
instruments.
And finally, and most important to this
study, was the paidotribes, the master of physical
training.
The three parts of education were theoretically of
equal importance, but physical training seemed to be emphasized as the boys aged into youths.
In Athens,
17
it is very likely in fact that intellectual
education preceded the course of gymnastic
training, and that from the age of fourteen
or thereabouts physical culture took precedence over intellectual~ though without
ousting it altogether.l~
No one was considered educated who had not at least learned
to wrestle, swim, and use the bow and sling.
20
And the
Greek, with his eye for physical beauty, regarded flabbiness, pale skin, lack of conditioning, or imperfect development as a disgrace.
The poorly developed youth was the
laughing stock of his companions.
21
A child began to practice gymnastics under the direction of the paidotribes between the ages of eight and
twelve.
The boys were divided into two classes according
to their age.
The first class was for boys up to fifteen,
and the next was for boys from fifteen to perhaps eighteen.
22
The exercises were held in the palaestra:
literally a "wrestling place".
The palaestra generally
took the form of an open air sports ground, square in
shape, and walled or surrounded by trees.
The floor was of
sand, and, where possible, it was located near a natural
source of running water.
swimming and bathing.
This provided a facility for
At Athens, where natural bathing
facilities were scarce, artificial facilities were constructed.
Along the sides of this area were covered rooms
which served as dressing rooms, rest rooms, baths, and
shops which provided the oil and sand with which the
18
athletes always annointed their bodies prior to exercising.
There were three special traits that characterized Greek
athletic exercise.
naked.
First, the athletes always exercised
Secondly, prior to exercising, they rubbed their
bodies with oil and then sprinkled them with fine sand.
This served two functions: it provided some protection from
the sun and bothersome insects, and it insulated them from
sudden changes of climate.
function as well.
It also performed a hygenic
After the athlete finished exercising,
he scraped himself clean with a strigil and then bathed-the oil and sand acting like soap, which was not commonly
used.
And, third, a flute was used to accompany the exer-
cises.
The Greeks believed "the life of man in every part
has need of harmony and rhythm." 23
The instructors at the palaestra varied in skill and
experience, and it was to those who were known to be skilled that the wealthy would send their sons.
Therefore,
the paidotribes of some fame and reknown could demand the
highest fees.
The boys were instructed in basic movement,
"gesticulation," rope climbing, leapfrog, tug of war, and
swimming.
They were also trained in running, jumping,
wrestling, and throwing the javelin and the diskos, scaled
down to size.
These latter exercises were the events seen
in most of the athletic festivals.
In 616 B.C., boys'
events in wrestling, boxing and pancration were added to
the Olympic Games, and special, optional training in these
19
.
events was given to boys who wanted to compete.
24
When
boys reached the age of sixteen, they were expected to pay
special attention to their physical training in forms that
would prepare them for war.
25
In most Greek cities somewhere between the
ages of sixteen and eighteen they were enrolled in corps, and for two years were subject to a strict military discipline under
officers appointed by the state. They learned
to use their weapons and ride; they hardened
their bodies by athletic exercise and hunting;
they gained practical experience in war by
acting as police patrols on the fron.tiers.
This time of life was especially devoted to
athletics and physical training.26
In Athens, wealthy youths between the ages of sixteen and
eighteen enjoyed a greater freedom, and instead of military training spent their time training under special
instructors at the public gymnasion.
The poor were gen-
erally resigned to abandoning athletics.
They could con-
tinue to exercise at the public gymnasion, but the special
training needed for competing was expensive and left for
the sons of the wealthy.
Training at the gymnasion was available for all ages
of freeborn Greeks who could afford it and was generally
a continuation, although in a more strenuous fashion, of
what the youths had received at the palaestra.
This was
augmented with riding, diving, the torch race, the race
. armor, an d h unt1ng.
.
27
1n
Training was available for those
who wished to compete in athletic competitions, but
20
provisions were also made for the many citizens who merely
wanted to keep physically fit.
The importance of proper
training was such that it was the trainers who first
became professionalized.
The athletic trainer held a
28
. 1 pos1t1on
. .
. .
soc1a
equa 1 to t h at o f a p h ys1c1an.
Training
for competitive athletes consisted not only of a regimen
of physical exercises, but of special diets that usually
excluded the drinking of wine and encouraged the eating of
large portions of meat.
29
Athletics in Spartan education were considered even
more important.
In fact almost all education was in physi-
cal training, and that was in preparation for war.
From
the moment of their birth, Spartan children were considered
the property of the state.
Throughout their young lives
they were subject to a harsh physical and moral discipline.
Not only were they trained in athletic exercises, they
were forced to live on meager, unappetizing diets and
endure purposely inflicted pain.
Boys were allowed only
one garment for all the seasons to toughen them to
exposure.
They were made to go without shoes to harden
their feet and to teach them to gracefully and quickly
traverse rugged terrain.
In Sparta, girls were also
given physical training and prepared themselves for
combat--the Spartan women sometimes provided a strong second line of defense.
They often exercised with the boys
and continued public gymnastics up until they were
21
. d . 30
marr1e
The Spartans believed that a hardy women
produced hardy sons.
The Spartans put too much emphasis on physical training, at least in view of any ideal of moderation conceived
by the Athenian philosophers.
They neglected most other
aspects of education or culture and were generally only
semi-literate.
In comic dramas of the time, Spartans are
often portrayed as country bumpkins with humorous accents.
But on the field of battle they were always a leading
force, and on the list of Olympic victors their numbers
were great.
31
In the day-to-day life of the ancient Greeks,
athletics provided recreation, maintained the health and
fitness of its many adherents, and assured that the polis
was always ready for a possible conflict.
But, from time
to time, this state of constant physical readiness and
potential ability needed to find some outlet or mode of
expression.
The defect of athletics proper and of all
systems of physical drill is that interest
is quickly exhausted. This defect was
remedied in Greece by constant competitions,
competitions for all ages and not only local
but national competitions.32
CHAPTER III
ATHLETICS AND RELIGION
Athletics played an important role in the relig±on df
ancient Greece, just as they had in many other aspects of
Greek life.
Many athletic activities and competitions
evolved directly out of religious ritual.
All of the great
Panhellenic athletic festivals are believed to have had
religious origins.
1
Athletic competi·tions were considered
to be appropriate forms of worship, especially in festivals
dedicated to those gods who were thought to be special
2
patrons of sports . . The study of ancient Greek religion
and religious practices is a vast subject, and I do not
presume to deal with it here except those aspects of it
that relate directly to athletics and competitions.
The religion of ancient Greece was a religion based
on a mythology dealing with the exploits of a large and
complex pantheon of deities, most of which were conceived
in the image of human beings.
Each polis
had its own
patron god, worshipped in the manner traditional to that
polis.
Although all of the Greeks worshipped the same
group of gods from a common mythology, the form of worship
was left to the discretion of the religious leaders of
the individual poleis.
3
There was no dogma insisting upon
the ways in which the gods were worshipped.
22
23
The most significant difference between the
religion of the Greeks and that of early
Oriental peoples lies in the fact that in
Hellas is found neither authoritative sacred
book, priestly caste, commandment, creed,
neither revelation, inspired holy founder,
nor religious reformer; neither reward in
heaven nor punishment in hell. Homer's
gods act disgracefully on many occasions;
4
they think in a bemuddled fashion like men.
Acting and thinking like men is a key concept in understanding the Olympian gods, and perhaps the key to understanding the nature of Greek religion.
The gods of ancient
Greece were at times petty, jealous, emotional, competitive, and unduly vengeful.
They were capable of lying,
cheating, and plotting against human-kind and amongst
themselves.
Their characteristics were essentially human,
but one of the major characteristics of Greek culture was
the constant celebration of humanity.
The Greeks had their
ideal, but even their ideal man was a man of balance--a
.man with equal portions of physical and intellectual
abilities and with equal amounts of the worldly and. the
spiritual.
The immortal gods had the power to influence the
natural events that would determine the ancient Greek's
survival, and it was the goal of Greek. religion to appease
and flatter these sometimes selfish and unpredictable gods
to assure that their control over these natural occurrenee would be favorably continued.
The manner of the
worship of the Olympian gods was the business of the
24
priests.
Priesthoods were normally hereditary, the
priests being chosen from the old aristocratic families. 5
The holding of an hereditary priesthood was a highly honorable position, but it never imposed on the holder any
particular religious way of life.
6
Athletics and Funeral Ritual
One aspect of ancient Greek religion important to the
study of athletics is the Greek outlook on life, death,
and the ceremonies that were held for the dead.
To the
Greeks human life was a magnificent, even if tragic, adventure, and they really gave little thought to a spiritual
life after the death of the body.
7
They did indeed
believe in Hades and an existence beyond the grave, but at
best Hades was a "shadowy, unsatisfying place."
8
Funeral customs demanded that the dead body be eremated.
After cremation, the ashes were placed in an urn
or vase which was buried in a cemetery beyond the city
walls.
9
The Greeks
beli~ved
that the only pleasure of the
dead was in remembering the joys of earth and life, and
therefore the funeral was a time for feasting and games. 10
At the graveside the mourning family and friends would
make offerings of mimic banquets for the refreshment and
nourishment of the departed spirit.
The spirit of the
dead was thought to still be dependent upon the material
things of this world.
11
25
Deaths resulting from certain sorts of occurrences,
such as childbirth, violence, or war, were often singled
out for special honor and treatment.
12
Sometimes these
special honors took the form of athletic competitions.
Funeral games were especially appropriate to the cults
. 13
d evote d to h ero wors h 1p.
. games were o f ten proAt hl et1c
mated by the deceased's family, not only to honor the dead,
but to display that family's power and wealth.
14
One of the earliest references to funeral games
appears in the Iliad.
According to Homer, the warrior
Achilles held athletic competitions in honor of his recently fallen friend Patroclus.
These games took place
after a complex funeral ceremony and the cremation of
Patroclus' body.
the events.
With spectacular detail Homer described
The first competition was a race for two-
horse chariots, prior to which certain characters emphasized the importance of skill, cunning, and mature judgrnent, as well as fairness in the contests.
Other competi-
tions are later described in boxing, wrestling, a foot
race, throwing the diskos
and the javelin, archery, and
an armed combat which was stopped by the concerned
onlookers.
In each of these events each competitor, regardless of
what place he finished, received a prize.
All the prizes
were given by Achilles out of his own stores.
The awards
presented in this funeral celebration were all material
26
goods including women who were skilled in domestic crafts,
oxen, mules, pots, cauldrons, gold, armor, and other
trophies of war.
There were also references to other fun-
eral games in the Iliad.
Old Nestor referred to his own
past glories at the games held at the funeral of King
Amarynceus, and he alluded to the "funeral and games that
followed great Oedipus' downfall."
15
Other funeral games appear in the epic legends--for
example, the games in honor of Pelcus, the king of Iolchus
in Thesally, in which a number of illustrious heroes took
part. 16
The need for some kind of contest, even if only a
boxing match, which served to appease the dead was evident
in many ancient cultures and may well have been a regular
feature of Greek funerals.
17
Although funeral games may
have only occurred at funerals of heroes or those dead
whose families could afford to include them in funeral
rituals, there are some historians who maintain that all
of the Greek athletic festivals evolved out of funeral
games held in honor of some hero. 18
Festivals
Greece is a rocky, stark, none too fertile land, yet
it has always maintained a primarily agricultural economy.
It depended upon the grain it produced plus figs, olives,
and a small vintage.
Since the most primitive times, the
principal events of the year consisted of ploughing,
27
sowing, and harvesting, and special rituals were regularly
held in an attempt to control the processes of vegetation
that were often critical for the survival of the communl•t y.
19
Rain was always needed as drought in summer was
a regular occurrence.
The failure of any crop meant hardship, that
of a major crop, famine.
The festivals and
fasts of the city, therefore, the basis of
its religious and civic calendar, were principally those of the agricultural year: fertility
rites in the fall and the winter, rites of purification and protection while the crops were
growing and celebrations at harvest time.20
In view of the pantheistic nature of Greek religion,
it is not difficult to imagine the number and frequency of
the ritual festivals devoted to the different gods who
were believed to control the various aspects of nature.
Although Zeus, brought into Greece by the southward
migrations of the Indo-Europeans as their "sky and weather
god", was thought of by the Greeks as the chief Olympian
god and "rain giver", it was usually the lesser gods to
which the most of these festivals were d~dicated.
21
All
of the festivals, based on the farmer's year, celebrated
the natural forces that promoted fertility and symbolized
the cyclical, recurring changes inherent in seasonal death
and rebirth.
22
This concept also applied to athletics as
the connection of athletic games both with
funerary customs and with religious festivals
28
soliciting the fruitfulness of the earth is
due to the belief of the ancients that life
and death stood in a dialectical relationship
to each other: the dead earth gives birth to
the new shoot, and the youths involved in the
competitions draw strength from the ~ead heroes
in whose honour they are competing. 2
These rustic, communal festivals were called
pangyreis.
They were usually dedicated to that deity that
each polis had chosen as its patron god.
These rituals
paid homage to the gods with sacrifices of a portion of
the polis' crop and valuable sheep and cattle.
rituals were not sober, pious events.
These
The festival was
usually capped by feasting in which the sacrifice given to
the god was later consumed by the members of the community.
This was one of the rare occasions that the peasantry ever
ate meat, especially beef.
The feasting was usually
accompanied by music, dancing, games, and general merrymaking.
These were times of joyous celebration, and after
the harvest was in there was certainly more leisure time
to engage in festivities.
24
This indicates that the festi-
vals of ancient Greece, although essentially for religious
purposes, were at the same time entertaining for the
general community and provided them with a needed diversion
from the strenuous routine of their working lives.
From.this seasonal routine carne the calendar of
ancient Greece.
This calendar was orginally based upon
lunar cycles but was later changed to more accurate solar
29
...... - · - · · · · ---···-········------
cycles.
---------
The major purpose of this change was to accurately
determine the proper time for the festivals and thus to
insure the accuracy of the principal events of the agricultural routine.
These festivals were of such importance to
the ancient Greeks that the
mo~ths
of the Athenian calendar
bore the name of the festival that occurred during that
month.
25
Primitive Greece was primarily a country of peasants
and
herd~men
overlaid by a higher culture and often
subjected to influences from the world outside.
But even
in later times, when much of Greece had been developed into
towns and urbanized into mercantile city-states, the tradition of these festivals continued.
Each polis had its own
patron deity, considered a citizen of that polis, and it
held at least one festival a year in honor of that god.
26
·Thus, ancient Greece was a country with a vast number of
festivals.
Although it will not be necessary to discuss
or describe all of these many £estivals, a look at three
of them should provide a fairly accurate representation
of the nature of Greek festivals.
The festivals to be
. discussed will be three Athenian festivals: the primitive
Rustic Dionysia, the more developed and urbanized Greater
Di<~mysia,
and a local athletic festival, the Greater
Panathenaia.
The three festivals all differ somewhat from
each other but also have many similarities with the
30
Olympic Games which, of course, was itself a festival.
The Rustic Dionysia
The Rural or Rustic Dionysia dates back to prehistoric times and was held in honor of Dionsysus, the god
27
.
o f w1ne
an d f ert1"1"1ty.
The festival started at the end
of autumn and lasted through the month of December.
It
consisted mainly of a procession bearing a large phallic
representation, a sacrificial offering, and a dithyramb
devoted to Phalles, the personified symbol of fertility
and the mythical companion in mischief of Dionysus.
This
procession was accompanied by groups of masked youths
involved in wild revelry and grotesque forms of mimetic
combats.
Through the month, as part of this basically
religious festival, were also held komos, phallic song·s
and dances, drinking contests, and competitive games.
As
an example:
the most popular contest consisted in
balancing oneself on a wine-skin oiled for
the purpose, and the young man who contrived
to stand on it the longest without slipping
carried off the skin and the wine~28
This description of a game connected with a festival
gives testimony of what can be interpreted as an essentially secular event coexisting with and occurring simultaneously with a sacred event.
In this case the secular
was an integral part of the sacred.
It is also evident
31
that this game was competitive, required some athletic
skill, and certainly must have been amusing to the spectators of this event.
If this sort of revelry was not
diverting enough for the spectators, the spectacle of the
processional surely must have been.
The Greater Dionysia
Following the Rural Dionysia came the important
Greater
Diony~ia,
a winter festival.
Winter was related to the world of night,
and also the region from where sprung the
subterranean and infernal powers and dispensers of wealth. And finally winter was
the season of the dead, when they once
more came in contact with the living who
evoked them in masquerades and processions
of masks. 29
This festival was an urbanized development of several
earlier rural festivals.
Plays were performed during the
course of the rites, including an elaborate passion play
representing the birth and rebirth of Dionysus.
This is
regarded by some scholars, specifically A.B. Cook, as the
possible origin of tragedy.
The comic form of the revels
common to the bawdy Rustic Dionysia was more popular than
the tragic plays of the Greater Dionysia.
As time went on,
comic plays also became an important part of the Greater
Dionysia, and the tragic plays became largely secularized
in both intent and content.
By the fifth century B.C.,
32
this festival had evolved enormously from the original,
orgiastic Dionysian rites.
The literary efforts of· the
poets and dramatists had become compe-titive, and these
competitions had motivated some of the finest literary
achievements of the time.
Although the religious rituals
inherent to this festival continued to exist, they had
been superseded in importance by the poetry and drama
contests.
Both of these non-athletic festivals had several characteristics in common.
Besides having purely
religi~us
functions, they both used the element of spectacle, especially in the forms of costumes and processi?nals, and they
both contained contests or competitions.
The ancient Greek
word for a contest or a conflict was agon.
Those things that we weakly translate as
"games" were in Greece agones:
the dramatic
festivals were agones--contests in which
poet was pitted against poet, actor against
actor, choregus against choregus.3l
These two important elements, spectacle and the contest
(or the agon), were also evident in the athletic festivals.
The Greater Panathenaia
Each summer in Athens, the festival known as the
Panathenaia was held in celebration of the birthday of
Athens' patron goddess, Athena.
This festival occurred
every year but was celebrated with additional splendor
33
.
. 32
every f our th year as t h e Greater Pana th ena1a.
Some of
this additional splendor was provided by competitions in
music and athletics.
The principal event of this festival
was the presentation of a new gown, or peplos, ·to the goddess Athena.
The festival and the presentation of peplos
existed at least from the seventh century, B.C. and probably much earlier.
556
B.c. 33
Athletic competitions were added in
The athletic competitions at Olympia began as
early as the eighth century 7 however the other three
Panhellenic athletic festivals appeared in the sixth
century. 34
Therefore, it seems Athens was following pop-
ular fashion in founding a recurrent series of athletic
. .
35
compet1t1ons.
Musical competitions were held on the first few days
of the festival.
The prizes awarded to the winners of
these contests were either crowns made of gilded, wild
olive branches or cash. 36
Some of the cash prizes were of
considerable value, and it is probable that the musicians
that came to Athens to compete in the musical contests
were highly skilled professionals of some fame and celebrity throughout Greece. 37
After these contests were com-
pleted, the athletic competitions took place.
These con-
sisted of the five standard events of Greek sports including a foot race, wrestling, boxing, pancration, and the
pentathalon.
races. 38
Added to these were horse and chariot
The athletes were separated into three
34
categories according to the competitor's age.
These
classes consisted of boys, beardless youths, and adult
men.
The victors were awarded jars of olive oil, and the
number of jars to be awarded each victorious athlete was
determined by the class in which he competed.
To the
39
.
.
.
anc1ent
Gree k s o 1 1ve
01. 1 was a very va 1 ua bl e commo d 1ty.
After the athletic events, there were several other
competitions.
These included a tribal competition in the
pyrrhic dance (a military dance in armor), a torch race,
a regatta or "contest of ships'', and a contest of manly
beauty.
and oxen.
The prizes for these contests were usually cash
The oxen that were won as prizes were usually
sacrificed to Athena, and then eaten by the victors and
I
their friends.
Those contests involving various Athenian
tribes, the torch race, and the regatta were confined to
Athenian citizens, but all the other contests were open to
anyone from within the Greek world;
Large numbers of
foreigners came to Athens every four years for the festival,
both as spectators and competitors.
They came not
only to watch the contests; they also came to witness the
.
great process1on.
40
The central feature of the spectacular procession
was the peplos--the new gown for the statue of Athena.
In
early times the statue at the Acropolis had been of lifesize proportions, but in the late fifth century, the
35
- - -·----- -----
------~-------
---- ----------------!
'
statue of Athena was rebuilt to a colossal size and the
E§Plos had to be proportionately enlarged.
Work was begun
on this garment nearly nine months prior to the festival
.· b y a team o f
41
. 1 s c h osen f rom t h e ar1stocracy.
.
young g1r
When the peplos was finished it was as large as a sail,
and indeed it was rigged to the mast of a ship that was
set upon wheels.
This elaborate cart, crewed by priests
and colorfully garlanded priestesses, was hauled through
the city from Kerameikos Gate to the shrine of the
Eleusinian Demeter on the slopes of the Acropolis.
From_
there it was carried by hand to the top of the Acropolis
where stood the statue of Athena.
The procession was
accompanied by horsemen, chariots and charioteers, with
armed men leaping off and on the chariots while they were
in motion.
These armed troops were led by Marshals, and
ahead of them were the city's elders carrying olive branches.
Preceding these were musicians playing flutes and
lyres, and small boys and girls carrying jugs, libration
bowls, incense burners, and trays of sacrificial offerings.
At the head of the procession were the animals to be
sacrificed, led by their attendents.
42
It was a remark-
able spectacle, even in Greece where this kind of public
ceremony was highly developed and a common occurrence.
It
has also been perpetuated in a unique representation on
the frieze of the Parthenon.
No other instance exists
where an architectural decoration of this sort on a Greek
36
'temple shows "not some events of Greek legend, but a con. temporary ritual. " 43
This festival, like the Rustic Dionysia and Greater
Dionysia, shows certain obvious characteristics.
Most
importantly, all three of these festivals seem to have
· naturally and unselfconsciously blended sacred elements
with elements that were seemingly secular.
It can be
assumed that for the ancient Greek there was no part of his
secular life that was not touched by the sacred, and there
was no part of his religious beliefs and celebrations that
were not motivated by his secular needs.
Additionally,
all three of these festivals made use of the power and
allurement of spectacle as well as that of games and competitions, although the specific nature of the spectacles
and contests varied with each festival and its particular
state of development.
The contests ranged from mere revel-
ries in the primitive Rustic Dionysia to highly organized
and often professional competitions in literature, music
and athletics in the Greater Dionysia and the Panathenaia.
The spectacles varied from simple processions of masked
and costumed celebrants to the elaborate processions
through the streets of Athens that attracted spectators
from all the reaches· of the Greek world.
Finally, in all
of these basically local festivals, the population, at
least for the duration of the festivities, seemed to be
separated into two distinct groups.
One group was the
37
audience and the other was the participant or performing
group.
This latter group was made up of the older, aris-
tocratic families.
These old families were thought to
have beginnings that reached back into the mythic past and
were therefore considered to be most appropriate in any
communion with the Olympian deities.
Religious leadership
was often considered one of the duties of civic leaders.
But even in those cases where children were used in the
rituals because of their purity and undoubted chastity, it
was the children of the aristocracy that were chosen and
thereby honored.
The group that made up the spectators
was thrust into that role by its inferior social position.
These are only three out of the great number of festivals
that occurred in ancient Greece, but in looking at these,
a pattern appears that can be taken as indicative of a
type of festival.
The great Panhellenic athletic festi-
vals were of this type, and the pattern apparent in the
festivals described will appear again in the description
of the Olympic Games.
CHAPTER IV
THE OLYMPIC GAMES
The Panhellenic character of the athletic festivals
at Corinth, Nemea, Delphi, and Olympia seemed to have been
recognized throughout the Greek world from the festivals'
beginnings and was never questioned.
These four athletic
festivals were sacred and known as the "festivals of the
crown." 1
This refers to the wreaths that were awarded to
the athletes who were victorious.
The awards at all four
of these festivals were not the valuable material prizes
that were given at the other athletic contests held in
ancient Greece but wreaths or "crowns" fashioned from the
branches of trees or bushes held sacred to each particular
festival.
2
The olive branch awarded at Olympia symbolized
the ideal for Greek athletics, and the "festivals of the
crown" were far more prestigious than any of the festivals
that awarded valuable material prizes.
These four festi-
vals formed a cycle of athletic competitions, and the
highest distinction that any athlete could attain was to
be victor at all four of the Panhellenic games.
3
I
The exact origins of these four festivals are obscured
by myths and legends, and the small amount of historical
data that might reveal these festivals' beginnings are
sparse, and at best uncertain.
evolved from old,
pre-athl~tic
38
These festivals probably
rituals.
Games were added
39
to the existing programs at Corinth, Delphi, and Nemea in
the late sixth century, B.C.
•rhe Olympic Games, the fes-
tival upon which the other three were modeled, was by far
the oldest, with the first victory recorded there occurring in 776 B.C.
There is sufficient reason to believe
that this is an exact date, and historians regard this as
the first fixed date in Greek history.
4
Origin of the Olympic Festival
The year 776 B.C. is the date of the first recorded
victory at Olympia, but tradition traces the origin of the
games to Heroic times.
Archeologists maintain that many
of the structures within the original Olympic precinct
predated the 776 B.C. date by several hundred years and
· that there was a village at Olympia at least as early as
the twelfth century B.C.
5
The Olympic festival is gener-
ally assumed to have been devoted to Zeus.
6
But the
antiquity of Olympia is proved by evidence there of primi· tive religious practices which preceded the worship of
7
.
d e1t1es.
. .
any o f t h e 0 1 ymp1an
. an d
.
T h e sanct1ty
o f 0 1 ymp1a
of the athletic festival held there dates back to times
far earlier that the coming of the Dorians or any other
Greek people.
8
The theories concerning the origins of this ancient
'festival are many, but none have been proven.
Even in
• ancient Greek t~~-~-S.- when the festival waE; __a__:r:e:_g~J:~J:"~X _________,
40
-
------~--
----~---------~---·
---------~~
'
; recurring event, the legends and myths about the festil
val's founding varied widely.
The chronicler Pausanias.,
• who lived in the first century A.D. and who was actually
in attendance at at least one of the festivals, relates a
story that gives the local explanation of the festivals'
' origin.
In connection with the Olympic Games the
Elean experts on very early times tell that
Cronus was the first to obtain the rule in
heaven, and that the men of that day, who
were known as the Golden Race, dedicated a
temple to Cronus in Olympia. When Zeus was
born Rhea is said to have entrusted the child
to the so-called Dactyls of Ida, said to
have come from Mount Ida in Crete. They
were: Heracles, Paeonaeus, Epinedes, Iasus,
and Idas. For amusement Heracles, who was
the oldest of them, arranged a racing contest
among his brothers, crowning the winner with
a branch of wild olive.
So Heracles of Ida
is reported to have first instituted the games
at that time, and to have given them the name
'of Olympic. Also they were celebrated every
fifth year because he and his brothers were
five in number.9
Heracles of Ida in this story is not to be confused with
the better known Theban Heracles.
. Dactyl.
Heracles of Ida was a
The Dactyli were fabulous creatures who were
credited with discovering the art of working iron with
10
.
f 1re.
According to legend, the infant Zeus was given to
them by Rhea to protect him from the jealous Cronus.
At
Olympia, on a hilltop bearing his name, was an alter
sacred to Cronus which "recalled a sovereignty even earlier than that of Zeus."
11
. · - - - - - - - - - - - - __________________________ !
41
I
r - -----
--.- -
-
. · - · - - ------.
---·-----·--- - - - - - - - - - -
~-··-
- - · ·--·-
· · - · - - - - - - - -·----- -----
---~--~- -------~--~-
-----,
i
I
There was also a legend about the Olympic Garnes that
'did indeed name Heracles of Thebes as the founder of the
.
• festival.
known labors.
After diverting the waters of the river
,Alpeus to wash out the Augean stable, Heracles was denied
i
!the payment of a portion of that herd which he had been
.Promised by King Augeus.
Years later, after his other
labors had been completed, Heracles returned to Elis at
the head of an army and after several setbacks slew the
king and installed Phyleus in his place.
his victory, he founded the games.
12
In celebration of
He marked out the
stadium himself and planted the grove of wild olive trees
,which were sacred to Zeus and which, according to Pindar
in his third Olympian Ode, Heracles brought with him from
the land of the Hyperboreans.
There were other legends and stories of how the games
started.
One claimed that the festival commemorated the
time in the distant past when Cronus and Zeus wrestled
there for the rule of the heavens and of Greece.
Others
said that Zeus himself founded the games in celebration of
.
· h lS
.
v1ctory over Cronus.
13
But the most widely known and
most popular story of the Olympic Garnes dealt with the
hero Pelops and King Oenarnaus.
According to this legend,
:King Oenarnaus ruled Elis in the days following Deucalion's
flood.
He was commanded by an oracle to give in marriage
· the hand of his
daughter Hippodamia
to anyone whd could
------ ---·--·-- -·- ------·-----~···-·-
-------~------·---~-------.-~.J
:
I
This came about as a result of one of his well-
'
42
i beat him in a chariot race.
Death was the penalty paid by
• anyone who tried and was vanquished.
The course over which
. the race was run was long for a chariot race as it started
· near Elis and ran over fifty miles to Corinth.
Each suitor
was given a head start--this was actually a pursuit rather
than a true race--but was always soon overtaken by King
Oenamaus.
Poseidon had given Oenamaus a pair of magic
horses that could not be outrun.
Finally Pelops, an
ancestor of the house of Atreus, came t6 try to win
Hippodamia and succeeded in bribing the royal charioteer
Myrtilus into exchanging the metal lynch-pins of his master's chariot with ones made out of wax.
As a result of
this change, the chariot's wheel fell off, Oenamaus was
thrown from the chariot, and he broke his neck and died.
Pelops then married Hippodamia and took over the kingship
·of Elis.
When Pelops died, the people of Elis held funeral
. h'1s h onor. 14
games 1n
Historians have also tried to discover the original
purposes of the Olympic Games, basing their theories not
on ancient myths and legends but on historical data and
archeological evidence.
The popular Pelops legend,
though, does sometimes serve as a starting point.
years, scholars accepted the funeral games theory.
For
Fun-
. eral games were common in the ancient world and appropriate to the hero cults.
15
Pelops was the major hero for
the whole Peloponnese peninsula.
The fact that Pelops was
43
considered at Olympia to be even more important than Zeus
is suggested by evidence that the athletes made sacrifices
to Pelops before they did to Zeus.
16
It is not known if
Pelops actually existed or was merely a mythical hero, but·
either way he could still have been the subject of devoted
worship by one of the many hero cults that existed in ancient Greece.
man.
To the ancient Greeks he was indeed
~
real
Even as late as the time of Pausanias, a coffer sup-
posedly containing the bones of Pelops and his goldenhilted sword were exhibited at Olympia, as were the graves
of King Oenamaus and the other suitors of Hippodamia.
17
But this hero worship/funeral game theory fails to justify ·
the regular renewal of this festival or, for that matter,
any of the other Panhellenic festivals which were also
supposed to have originated as funeral commemorations for
some great hero.
18
There were indeed sacrifices to the
hero Pelops, held at his supposed tomb, but these took
'place annually whereas the Olympic Games occurred every
four years.
Cornford observes that "we have no reason to
believe that [the Olympic Games] were even held at the
same time of the year."
19
He refutes the entire funeral
theory for the Panhellenic athletic festivals.
The case of Pelops is, moreover, exceptionally
favorable to the funeral theory. The "dead"
who were connected with the other centres of
Panhellenic games were not chieftains whose
war-like deeds could be commemorated. At
Nemea the "dead" who was honoured was
44
. -··-·--
----·- ----·- ·------
··-
-·- ·--
-
.. . .
..... ···--
.
-
.. ·---··-·-
-- ----·--·--··---···--····-------··-;
Archemoras, an infant; at the Isthmus,
20
Glaukas, a sea demon, at Pytho, a snake.
Cornford goes on to suggest that "the Games were a moveable
·feast determined by astronomical considerations" and final-.
ly that "the Games are to be regarded as originally and
essentially a New Year's festival--the inauguration of a
year."
21
Other scholars suggest that in ancient times the festival may have consisted of human sacrifices which, as more
humane notions prevailed, became combats and later still,
mock combats or athletic competitions.
22
It has also been
pointed out that throughout Greek history athletic competitions have custQmarily been linked with lulls in war,
both to display skill and readiness and to employ idle
.
23
energ1es.
In prehistoric times the king was, at certain predetermined intervals, required to give physical proof of
his continuing right to rule.
The form that this "proving"
took was usually actual, albeit organized, combat.
In most
.Greek cities the king's reign lasted for only eight years,
then had to be renewed by Zeus.
24
In later times, although
still much earlier than the historical era of the Olympic
Games, these combats had evolved into athletic competitions.
In primitive times the public games were
doubtless only a means of periodically
45
testing the vital energies of the reigning
king.
It victorious, he commenced a new
reign, if beaten he yielded up his place,
and also his wife or daughter, to the
victor. 25
This sounds very much like what occurred in the legends
about Zeus and Cronus and even more like what happened in
the story of Pelops and Kind Oenamaus.
Thus, the Olympic
Festival may well have evolved directly out of some ancient
ritual used to determine the succession of power and
authority.
Finally, it is suggested by some historians that the
festival at Olympia, as well as the other three Panhelenic athletic festivals, probably began as a ritual consecrated to the fruit harvest.
This particular theory is
supported by the facts that all of these festivals were
"festivals of the crown" where the awards were all of an
agricultural nature; and at least at Olympia the adoring
crowds always showered the victorious athletes with flowers and leaves.
This practice was very closely connected
with the rituals of an ancient vegetation cult in which
some historians believe the games had their roots.
26
But
the question remains that if this was indeed a festival
devoted to agriculture and the deities that influenced
its success, why were athletic competitions included?
answer most surely lies in the nature of the ancient
Greeks and in the way they conceived of their gods.
The
46
--
·----- ----------------- -----·---
-~----,
, Parke, in discussing the addition of competitions in music
or athletics into religious festivals, explains that
the Greek in this matter [musical competitions] is more likely to have been
interested in the positive beauties of
melody.
In the same way the association
of athletic games and the performing of
plays with certain Greek festivals was
partly determined by the fact that the
Greeks enjoyed these activities and were
prepared to believe their gods looked on
them in the same way.27
History and Description of the Olympic Festival
The Olympic Games was a very ancient festival and
survived, with only minor changes, for a great number of
years.
Throughout the better part of this long period
it retained its immense importance and popularity for the
Greek people.
It can be assumed that the public for whom
the Homeric poems were composed were already fond of ath'
28
.
cornpet1' t 1ons.
1 e t 1c
Pausanias tells of events of
i.
Olympia even earlier than Horner.
Gods are related to have won victories there;
Apollo is said to have outstripped Hermes in
a footrace, and to have defeated Ares in
boxing.
They say that is why it is tradition
for flutes to play a Pythian melody during
the pentathlon jumping--the flute being
sacred to Apollo, and Apollo himself having
won in the Olympics.28
It is known that in prehistoric times many IndoEuropean tribes migrated into Greece from the north.
They
47
---- --
-------~-----
-----------~---------~----.
:moved southward around the Gulf of Corinth until they were
·stopped by the broad river Alpheus.
As new waves of
immigrants arrived, the old tribes were forced on.
The
' earliest of the tribes to migrate into this area set up a
shrine to the northern "sky god" and "rain giver", Zeus.
; The later tribes were also worshippers of Zeus and continued the tradition of holding a festival in his honor which
included--for whatever reasons--chariot races and athletic
games.
Games.
30
These, of course, were the original Olympic
Control of this festival was originally in the
hands of the Pisatans, but their authority was eventually
disputed by the Eleans, a group of later immigrants from
the north.
In the course of the conflict between these
two powers, the games themselves were neglected and eventually forgotten.
After many years of fighting between
these two groups, Cleosthenes, the king of Pisa, and King
Iphitus of Elia grew weary of the war and made peace.
In
celebration of the end to their conflict, they revived the
festival and the games.
at 776 B.C.
The date of this event is placed
31
The importance, popularity, and longevity of the
Olympics Games were the results of several key conditions.·
One of the most fundamental was the festival's geographic
location.
No place in the Peloponnese was more
48
-- ---··-· ---·- ----------- -------·----------,
I
accessible to other parts. Besides the
coast route that connected with Messenia
and the Gulf of Corinth, the valleys of the
Alpheus and its tributaries afforded a
means of ~ommunication with all parts of the
interior. 2
A great part of the success and fame of the festival was
in large measure due to the
org~nizational
characterized the early Greeks. 33
genius that
The fesitvals' use as
a political tool cannot be overlooked.
This political
importance was due to the exposure it afforded.
Word of
an Olympic victory spread through the Greek world at an
astounding rate, considering the state of communications
at that time.
The festival attracted many tyrants and the
politically ambitious who sought to enhance and increase
their own prestige with an Olympic victory.
Listed among
the victors in the chariot races at Olympia are Myron and
Cleisthenes of Sicyon and Periander of Corinth, while
Cylon, the would-be tyrant of Athens, won a victory in the
foot race.
34
The trend towards greater democratic thinking was
strongly reflected at Olympia.
Competitive athletics was
11 y an ar1stocrat1c
.
.
.
35
. .
tra d 1t1ona
exerc1se.
In the military,
competition was limited to the officers who were exclusively from the aristocracy.
The common warriors had to
content themselves with watching and cheering for their
favorite leaders. 36
This functioned not only as a means
49
of diversion for the war-weary troops, but competitions
between their leaders were supposed to be "inspirational"
to the common soldiers, building their morale by showing
the officers' tirelessness, and most certainly reaffirming
those leaders' physical abilities and thus their superiority.
This, naturally, reaffirmed the officers' claim
to the rights of leadership and authority.
37
But at the
Olympic Games
noble and peasant met on equal terms. The
aristocratic prejudice against these contests did not yet exist; and though the
honour of the Olympic crown was open to the
poorest citizen of Greek birth, such was
the prestige of the festival that it was
coveted even by the highest.38
Regardless of his social class or economic situation, any
Greek citizen was allowed to compete at Olympia.
But
among those who came to see the games, even slaves and
"barbarians" were welcomed.
39
The only group that was
excluded from coming to Olympia was married women. 40
Why
this restriction was made is not known, but it was strictly enforced.
An Elean law prescribed that "any woman that
crossed the Alpheus to witness the Olympic Games should be
thrown from the top of Mount Typaion."
41
For the first half-century after its restoration in
776 B.C., the Olympic Games was the local festival of the
Eleans and other pre-Dorian peoples from the west.
42
so
-·--
,-·- ·1
-------~--.
----~----------------~------l
i
Throughout its long history it remained purely and
exclusively Hellenic, although in the festival's final
years--after it had undergone a number of corruptions due
to Roman control--provisions were made whereby certain
Romans were allowed to compete.
43
Naturally, during the
festival's more than thousand years' duration, there were
certain changes made in its organization and in the athletic events themselves.
But considering the festival's
extraordinary timespan the number of these changes was
extremely small, and most appeared relatively.early in its
history.
The organizers, managers, and judges for the Games
were called the Hellanodicae.
According to Pausanias, the
management of the fif.tieth Olympics was entrusted to two
men who were chosen by lot from all adult male Eleans.
For the ninety-fifth Olympiad nine Hellanodicae
appointed as judges.
were
Three of these were in charge of the
equestrian events, three were put in charge of the pentathlon, and the other three oversaw all of the remaining
events.
Finally, in the one hundred and.third Olympiad,
one man from each of the twelve Elean tribes was chosen
to serve as a Hellanodices.
44
The athletic events were also subject to some modification during the festival's early history, although these
changes usually took the form of small additions to the
51
-----~-·
-------------·~-----------·--
--·-
---------- --------- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1
II
;program to accommodate younger athletes.
The games held
at the sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia in prehistoric times
:may have consisted of only a footrace and perhaps a
chariot race in honor of Pelops.
But from the first of
the reinstituted Olympic Games the program contained a one
stade (600 ft.)
foot race, a chariot race for two-horse
war chariots, the diskos and javelin throws, plus boxing
The two stade foot race was instituted in
and wrestling.
724 B.C., and the long distance foot race in 720 B.C.
The
pentathlon--an event that combined five other contests
including the javelin, the diskos, a foot race, boxing,
and wrestling--was added to the program in 708 B.C.
In
648, the program was expanded to include the brutal mixture of boxing and wrestling known as the pancration, as
well as a horse race and a race for four-horse racing
chariots.
The late seventh century saw the introduction
of events for boys in wrestling, boxing, and racing.
In
520 B.C., the hoplite, a race in armor was included, while
a few new equestrian events, a pancration for boys, and
non-athletic contests for heralds and trumpeters came
shortly after.
45
The Olympic Games took place every four years (five
when determined by the ancient Greek calendar) , and an
Olympic year was an anxiously awaited happening.
The
Greek calendar was conceived in order to solve a single,
52
_particular problem--to
'o1 ymp1c
· f est1va
·
1 . 46
accurat~ly
set the time for each
h
1 og1ca
· 1 system va l"d
T h eon 1 y c.rono
1
· throughout Greece was the system based upon the periods
.between Olympic festivals.
47
The first proclamation or
announcement of this eagerly awaited festival came from
the spondophorae, a group of citizens of Elis who wore
crowns of olive branches and traveled from city to city
throughout the Greek world, heralding the coming of the
games and announcing and guaranteeing the sacred truce.
48
The sacred truce, a period of anywhere from one to
49
.
.
th ree mont"h s, was k nown as h e1romen1a.
During this
period all hostilities ceased and free access was allowed
to the country of the Eleans, which itself was declared
neutral and inviolable.
All those who wished to go to
Olympia, either as spectators or participants, were free
to travel even through territories with which their own
states were at war.
All armed individuals or army units
were strictly forbidden to enter Elis, and no penalty of
death was permitted to be executed for the duration of the
truce.
50
Any violation or infringement of the terms of
this truce--and violations were so few as to be insignifi-:
cant--was looked on as not merely a crime but a
sacr1"1 ege. 51
An athlete coming to Olympia to compete in the games
was required to arrive there at least a month in advance
-
-
-
--·----~-----------·----~~
53
of the contests to train under the supervision of the
special Elean judges.
He had to prove to them that he had
, been in training for the last ten months.
Prior to this
period of extensive training an athlete was also required
. to give evidence of his and his father's pure Greek birth
·and to give an oath that neither he nor any member of his
family had ever done anything that rnigh·t be considered a
.
sacr1'1 ege aga1nst
a go d . 52
After the training period,
when all of the athletes had satisfied the priests as to
their moral and physical fitness to compete in the games,
each athlete gave public thanks to the gods and sacrificed
a black ram to Pelops and a pig to Zeus.
games were declared open.
With that the
53
The spectators carne from the most remote corners of
Greece to be at Olympia to honor the gods and to watch the
athletic competitions in this most spectacular of Greek
1 s. 54
.
f est1va
The rich arrived in carriages or on horse-
back while the poorest of the Greeks carne by foot.
-strata of society were represented:
All
poets, philosophers,
politicians, tyrants, and the common villagers and tradespeople.
They all carne together into the valley of the
Alpheus where they slept in the open or under trees, or
else pitched tents or erected crude shelters out of the
branches and leaves they found there.
It was not until
the fourth century B.C., that a permanent structure was
i
·-·---·----------------__j
54
:built to accommodate important visiting dignitaries. 5
The festival lasted for five days.
5
The first day was
devoted to ritual sacrifices to Zeus and to the local hero
· Pelops.
Sacrifices were offered up at the altar of Zeus
·on the grounds and also on the six double altars that were
. popularly believed to have been erected by Heracles.
·Libations were poured over the tomb of Pelops, and the
remainder of the day was given over to the sporting
events. 5 6
One can only speculate as to what a spectator saw or
felt while he attended the festival.
Will Durant offers
this somewhat fanciful description.
We picture the pilgrims and athletes starting
out from distant cities, a month ahead of time,
to come together at the games.
It was a fair
as well as a festival; the plain was covered
not only with the tents that sheltered the
visitors from the July heat, but with a
thousand concessionaires who exposed for sale
everything from wine and fruit to horses and
statuary, while acrobats and conjurors performed their tricks for the crowd.
Some
juggled balls in the air, others performed
marvels of agility and skill, others ate
fire or swallowed swords: modes of amusement, like forms of superstition, enjoy a
reverend antiquity.57
The stadium in which most of the competitions were
held was rectangular in shape and was surrounded on all
four sides by a dirt embankment.
This provided seating
or standing room for between 45,000 and 50,000 spectators.
58
These were not really seats but rather tiers.
55
'
The spectators were never charged an admission fee nor was
space in the viewing area ever reserved, although seating
space was provided for certain special dignitaries and the
festival officials.
Except for moving to the oval shaped
Hippodrome for the chariot races and the other equestrian
events, spectators kept their places in the stadium all
day long, pestered by the insects, heat, and thirst.
Des-
pite the intense heat, it was forbidden for the spectators
to wear hats.
It has been suggested that this was done to
insure unobstructed viewing for all the spectators.
The
available water was generally bad, and the area was infested with flies and mosquitos.
But all of these discorn-
forts did not discourage the spectators from corning to
Olympia.
To the Greek, "his favored athletes were his
earthly gods."
59
The competitions were arranged and supervised by the
purple-cloaked Hellanodicae, and the start of each event
was announced by trumpeters.
The foot race was always
held first, and each Olympiad bore the name of the victor
in this event.
The most popular contests for the crowd
were the spectacular and dangerous chariot races in v1hich
sometimes as many as forty four-forse chariots competed at
60
.
th e same t 1rne.
Incidents of athletes cheating at Olympia were rare
and were dealt with severely.
For example, in 388 B.C.,
'
56
Eupolis of Thessaly bribed his opponents in boxing in
order to win the prize and the honor and glory that went
with it.
This offense was soon discovered, Eupolis' prize
was taken back, and he and all of the guilty parties were
heavily fined.
The fines collected from this group were
used to build bronze statues of Zeus that were placed at
the entrance to the stadium, bearing inscriptions that
warned all other athletes against the dangers of
.
c ..h eat1ng.
61
The fifth and last day of this festival ended as the
'first day had begun.
After sacrifices to Pelops and Zeus
there was a solemn procession ending in a banquet given by
the victorious athletes and possibly by their city patrons.
The awards were presented, and the victors' names were
proclaimed by heralds, along with their fathers' names and
62
f or wh'1c h t h ey were compet1ng.
.
.
t h e names o f t h e po 1 e1s
In its final years the Olympic Games were corrupted
by over-professionalism and specialization by the competitors, by the influx of less than idealistic Roman influence, and by competition with Roman tastes and entertainment forms.
After an uninterrupted run of more than a
thousand years, the games were halted by a decree of the
Roman Emperor Theodosius in 394 A.D.
In 426 A.D.,
Theodosius II destroyed the remaining structures.
Finally,
around 530 A.D., as if by the hand of some outraged or
merely disappointed god, an earthquake destroyed the ruins,
57
and the river A1pheus rose and covered most of the
.
.
63
01 ymp1an
p 1 a1n.
CHAPTER V
POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT AND THE OLYMPIC GAMES
Popular Entertainment
Prior to subjecting the Olympic Games to analysis as
a form of popular entertainment, it will be necessary to
provide a definition of the term "popular entertainment"
as it will be used in this thesis.
This definition re-
duces any activity that can possibly be seen as a form of
popular entertainment into three basic parts:
former, the audience, and the performance.
the per-
In addition,
each of these three parts must meet certain stipulations
or required conditions.
The performer must be clearly
distinguishable from the audience and be perceived by it
as a deliberate performer.
Likewise, the audience must be
distinguishable from the performer, and it must be aware
of itself as an audience.
The activity that constitutes
the performance must be either intended by the performer
or perceived by the audience primarily to divert, amuse,
or entertain that audience.
"Any forms or examples of
particular activities which meet each of these conditions
can properly be included in[a]definition of popular ·
theatre and entertainment."
1
The Olympic Games meet all
of the stipulated conditions and can therefore be analyzed'
from the perspective of popular entertainment.
58
59
-·----
----
--~~-----~~-··----·-----------
-----~---------
·--- - - - - · - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - · 1
The major performers at the Olympic Games were the
athletes.
They were clearly distinguishable from the
spectators in a number of ways.
'
1
For one, they were separ-
ated by the physical layout of the site.
The athletic com-
petitions took place inside of the stadium or, in the case
1
of the equestrian events, in the Hippodrome, while the
spectators observed the events from surrounding tiered
embankments that were provided for this purpose.
2
The
athletes were obviously distinguishable from the spectators
by their costume in that the athletes always performed
naked.
The spectators were always fully clothed, as were
the event judges--the Hellanodicae.
3
The athletes also
differed from the spectators in light of their exhaustive,
possibly life-long training, including the intensive training they underwent at Olympia prior to the festival.
Phy-
sical training was a common pastime among all Greeks who
possessed the leisure to indulge in it, but the years of
training needed to develop the highly specialized skills
and agility demanded of a successful Olympic athlete was
·beyond the means of the majority of Greeks.
The prospec-
tive Olympian also had to be born with the physical "raw
material" that could make
hi~
development into an athlete
of the Olympian caliber possible.
Whereas the athlete at
Olympia was a living model of a physical ideal, the spectators that came to Olympia were of every size, shape,
i
60
degree of fitness and health, and from every walk of life.
The prime concern of the athlete was competing
against his fellow athletes in his chosen event or events.
Although he had no direct contact with the audience nor
perhaps any real need of its presence, he was certainly
aware of it.
Considering the many times the festival had
regularly occurred in the past, an athlete knew beforehand
that a large group of spectators would be there to observe
the competitions.
His awareness of the esteem that the
audience would have for him and of the honors which it
would bestow upon him should he be victorious had to be
(after, ideally, self-satisfaction) a prime motivation for
his performance.
In this light the athlete was aware of
himself as a performer.
Much of what has been said about the athlete above
also applied to the spectators.
They were aware of them-
selves as a group apart from the athletes; but those
spectators who came from the same polis as a victorious
athlete could, by association, share in his victory.
They
were also aware of themselves as a group watching these
competitions and the athletes for the enjoyment of sport.
As Durant says of this audience, "we must not think of the.
average Greek as a lover of Aeschylus or Plato; rather,
like the typical Briton or American, he was interested in
sports."
4
61
The performance consisted of the athletic competitions.
The ancient Greek's love of all kinds of competitions has
already been mentioned.
The large assortment of athletic
competitions that were held at Olympia, as well as the many
other non-athletic, although spectacular and diverting
events, provided a source of amusement and entertainment
which attracted audiences from all over the Greek speaking
world for many hundreds of years.
The Olympic Games met
the conditions of the stipulated definition and can therefore be seen as a form of popular entertainment.
To
analyze how this activity functioned as a popular entertainment, a detailed description will be made of the festival's three elements:
the performer/athlete, the audience/
spectators, and the athletic competitions which made up
the performance.
The Athlete/Performer
, i
The first question that arises about the athletes at
this festival is:
who were they?
Theoretically, any male
Greek citizen who had undergone the rigorous training
required--both at horne and at Olympia--and was judged fit to
compete by the festival's officials, was allowed to participate.
Olympians.
But economical realities excluded many would-be
In the very early years of the festival the
competing athletes were all from the nobility or
- .. -----····-·-----------------------------·J
62
aristocracy. 5
costly.
Training and traveling to the games were
At the site, the athlete had to pay for his board
and lodging.
If he should happen to be victorious in his
event he was expected to give a banquet for everyone that
was involved and to make expensive sacrifices to Zeus.
6
Sometimes a popular athlete who could not afford to compete in the games on his own would be helped by a wealthy
patron or maybe even sponsored by the civic leaders of his
1 •
pc~1s.
In the end though, the high cost of training and
competing forced the amateur out.
Although officially the
Greeks never made any distinction between amateur and professional athletes, the Olympiads coming after the
P
.
_e 1 oponnes1an
war-mar k e d
th e age o f pro f ess1ona
.
1'1sm .. 7
The
professional athlete was a highly skilled and highly
specialized individual.
Where the earliest Olympic com-
petitors had been well balanced, all-around athletes who
competed in many different events, the highly trained professional athlete was usually ill-proportioned and over
trained and could be successful in only the one event for·
which he had trained.
The old athletic ideal was aban-
doned, which elicted not a little criticism.
Xenophanes
always asserted the superiority of mind and intellect over
strength, and he thought that his renown should be greater
than any athlete's.
Euripides said that no evil in Greece
was worse than the race of athletes; and
Plato~
in The
63
Rep~blic,
called the athletes sleepy, useless, unintellia
gent, and like animals.J
It has been shown that physical training was an integral part of all boys' educations.
Those who could afford
to rem3in in school or boys who showed a special aptitude
for athletics could continue their physical training for
as long as they wished.
There were many compet.itons at the
local level, and the athletes that were successful at this
level could hope to test themselves against the best athletes from throughout the Greek world at Olympia.
The
competitors to be met at Olympia '\vere the products of many
years of training and competition and showed the highest
levels of skill possible.
This was, of course, a major
attraction for the thousands of spectators that attended
each Olympic festival.
To witness the finest examples of
a pastime that was popular within all levels of Greek
society was a rare and coveted pleasure.
The athlete did not disguise himself .at all.
no costume nor portrayed any character.
He represented no
one but himself and performed completely naked.
were several reasons for this.
passion for physical beauty.
He wore
There
One came from the Greek
Greek art is full ·of objects
that express this zeal for manly, physical beauty.
The
athlete, as a model of the physical ideal, would never
hide or cover up the visual proof of the results of his
64
personal struggle to attain this ideal.
There was also a
practical reason for the athlete's nude performance:
the
freedom from encumbering clothing aided the performance
and was therefore considered the most practical mode of
dress for any athletic endeavor.
10
In training, the ath-
letes always annointed their bodies with oil to protect
them from the sun and pesky insects, but a part of their
training involved sunbathing in order to produce a healthy
looking and attractive bronze skin.
11
We can assume from
this that these athletes were very aware that they would be
appearing and performing in front of an audience and were
concerned about the quality of their appearance.
12
With
only a few exceptions, the athlete used no apparatus to
protect him or any device to aid his performance.
The
exceptions were in boxing--where a type of glove was worn
to protect the fists--in jumping, in throwing the diskos
and the javelin and, of course, in the equestrian events
which employed horses and chariots.
Jumpers used small
weights held in their hands to increase momentum while
jumping.
The diskos was a circular stone weight, and the
javelin was a spear thrown with the aid of a sling.
There
was nothing aside from these which added to or distracted
from the pur.i ty of compe·ti tion between human wills and
bodies.
Determining the extent of the interaction among the
65
performers--or competitors--presents a complex problem.
Each athlete was a solo performer as there were rto team
sports in the Olympic Games.
But, as these events were
competitions, each athlete was dependent upon the other
athletes against whom he was competing.
Individual rec-
ords of time, distance or any other quantitative means
were not kept by the
Greeks~
Thus, the sole proof of an
athlete's skill was shown by winning over the other ath13
.
.
.
wh om h e was compet1ng
at t h e tlme.
Th ere1 etes aga1ns·t
fore each performer was an individual pitted directly
against all the other individual athletes, but it was only
by being the best among them that he could claim the glory
of an Olympic crown.
It was this coming together of the
best of all Greek athletes and their clashing head on to
determine the best of the best--where the victor's name
and glory would
presu~ably
live throughout history, and
the rest, although their devotion and struggle may have
been equal to that of the victor, would soon be forgotten--that provided these events with the dramatic atmosphere that characterized this festival.
The athlete's stake, or risk of pain, injury, or
possible death, varied with the different events.
The
physical training that prepared an athlete for competition·
at the Olympic level must certainly have involved a great
deal of pain and fatique.
From this tortuous regimen came
66
some of the element of agon that, at least in the eyes of
the
spectato~s,
brought to all of the athletes
~
certain
heroic and mystical quality, even before the games had
begun.
As with training, it can be assumed that any large
output of physical exertion during the competitions would
be accompanied by expected amounts of pain and fatigue,
but in most of the events the athlete ran very little risk
of injury or pain.
This was the case in the running
events, the throwing of the javelin, and the hurling of
the diskos.
of risk.
In other events there existed larger amounts
Boxing and wrestling often led to injury, and in
the case of boxing an athlete was occasionally crippled.
The boxer wore a type of glove, but its purpose was to
protect his hand, not to soften the blows to his opponent.
The boxers were matched by lot, rather than by weight, and
fought until one opponent was unable to continue or gave
up.
The pancration became very brutal and was notorious
for causing painful and crippling injuries.
It was par-
tially a result of many athletes' unwillingness to take
part in this dangerous event that the trend toward pro-
1'1sm
.
f ess1ona
b egan. 14
Probably the most dangerous events were the chariot
races.
Here the chance of accidents was always present,
and an accident could lead to serious or even fatal injuries.
Oddly enough, it was the owners and entrants of
67
the chariots who received the honors of victory, not the
drivers who had shown the skill and taken the risks.
drivers were merely employees of the owners.
The
In relation
to many other entertainment forms, the physical hardships
endured and the risks taken by the Olympian athletes were
high.
This was one major aspect that separated the ath-
lete from the spectator, who probably respected the pain
of the athlete's struggle and thrilled at the almost
heroic risks which the athlete accepted with grace and
beauty.
An athlete's stake in the games was high, but it
could easily be justified in view of the rewards attainable after a victory.
Although the only material prize
that was awarded to an athlete was a crown fashioned from
the branches of the sacred olive trees, the rewards an
athlete would receive outside of the sanctuary would be of
a far greater practical value.
Of course, the personal
glory and honor that came with an Olympic victory was, at
least to the athlete of those times, enough to justify the
venture.
By winning an event at the Olympic Games an ath-
lete had presented himself to the spectators in attendance
as well as the rest of the world--as soon as the news of
his victory was circulated---as a model of the "power and
beauty of that noble and distant ideal."
15
In addition to
appealing to any ideal of manly beauty, balance, and
68
-.----
----------------------~----~---;
prowess, an athletic victor also complied with the Greek
concept
6£ arete--the aristocratic ideal of manly Virtue.
coupled with noble deeds and bravery.
pression of human
aret~
The ultimate ex-
(this concept could be applied to
inanimate objects as weLL) was.th2 trained athlete who was
willing to put himself into a
co~test
against others of
presumably equal ability, devot:Lon, and desire for victory.
H.D.F. Kitto states, "the contest (whether it be athletic,
dramatic, or poetical) was a means of
stimul~ting
and dis-
playing l:.urnan arete, and this was a worthy offering to the
gods.
"16
Besides the personal self-satisfaction and noble
glory that was gained by a victorious athlete, there were
other rewards.
An Olympic victor was welcomed home with
much pomp and great rejoicing.
Many poleis from which
carne Olympic champions erected statues of them, comrnissioned poets to compose odes in their honor, and treated
the~ like minor gods. 17
By the fifth century, many ath-
. t s o f cu lt wors h"1p. 18
1 e t es h a db ecorne the o b Jec
as the sixty-first Olyrnpiad[c. 492]
As early
victors were allowed
to erect statues of themselves inside the sanctuary at
Olympia.
Victors in the games automatically became
members of the Athletae, an elite athletic organization
whose members maintained their own gyrnnasion where they
trained for future contests and met to discuss matters of
interest and importance to the athletic world. 19
- -
Spartan
---~---------------~----
69
victors were allowed to ride beside their king and lead
their troops into battle, which to them was indeed a very
great honor.
Respect for Olympic champions was so great
and wide-spread that when Philipus of Croton (an Olympic
victor) was killed in an attack upon Sicily, the Sicilians,
his mortal enemies, erected a shrine on the spot where he
ha·a f allen. 20
All of the many athletic competitions that took place
throughout Greece except the four "festivals of the crown"
offered material prizes.
Although these four festivals
promised the most honor and glory, the new professional
athlete demanded more for his efforts.
The Greeks never
distinguished between amateur and professional athletes,
and athletes could make a good living by traveling to all
the games, even at Olympia.
Because of the rivalries that
so often existed between poleis and the political careers
that could be advanced by producing an Olympic champion,
~
potential victor would often be subsidized by the
leaders of his polis.
When an athlete returned home
• victorious he was often, in addition to the adoration of
his fellow citizens, loaded with valuable gifts and in
many cases taken care of for the rest of his life.
21
It
was actually a law in Athens that an Olympic victor be
presented with 500 drachmas,
and victors at the other
"festivals of the crown" were to receive 100.
22
Sometimes,
70
upon a promise of later payment, a top athlete would
compete for a polis other than his own.
Thus arose a
group of professional athletes who were essentially freelancers who would compete for the highest bidder.
23
The Olympic athlete was a highly trained and skilled
performer.
His prowess was well rewarded by the adoration
and glorification of others, and he was highly paid,
whether it be in personal glory or actual material gains.
The evolution from the pure amateur athlete to the professional reflected societal changes as much as changes in
the Olympic Games.
Most importantly, the Olympic athlete
set himself apart from his fellow men.
Before them he
performed deeds which both he and the spectators knew
they could never perform as well.
Also, the athlete knew
if he was victorious at Olympia his name would be recorded
on the Olympic list of champions and, in some small way,
he would have gained immortality.
Spectators/Audience
In early times the group that made up the audience
at the Olympic Games was very much akin to the group that
made up the athletic contestants.
In the years of the
true amateur prior to the Peloponnesian War, both groups
shared the same appreciation of a physical ideal and
honored the noble and aristocractic concept of arete.
-~·-
The
----~-----------~---·---~
71
of spectators certainly differed from the athletes
in terms of natural ability, amount of training, and devo-.
tion to the rigors of athletic competition.
As profes-
sionalism and specialization rose in prominence, the differences between the spectators and the athletes naturally
increased.
Again like the athletes, the spectators were
theoretically from all social strata of Greek male citizens.
Unmarried girls were also allowed to attend, but
married women were expressly forbidded.
This was essenti-
ally a male group, supposedly encompassing men of all
social and financial rankings.
Although the realities of
the expenses of traveling to Olympia and of lodging once
one had arrived there actually
limit~d
the group of spec-
tators, except for a few locals, to men of some means.
The audience consisted of two types.
One was the
individual spectator who made his independent pilgrimage
to the Olympic Games.
These independents came to Olympia
in large numbers, making up the greatest part of the
audien6e.
The other group was the highly visible official
. missions sent to the games by the many participating
poleis.
These groups, known as the theroriai, were made
up from the cities' wealthiest and most distinguished
citizens.
They brought with them valuable gifts for Zeus
and for the many other lesser dieties worshipped locally,
as well as gifts to be presented to the rulers of Elis.
72
These missions often competed against one another in
grandeur, showing off their city's wealth, piety, and
.
generos1ty.
24
The importance of the role played by athletics in the
social and educational lives of the ancient Greeks as well
as the popularity of the great number of athletic competitions has already been mentioned.
The practice of ath-
letics was almost universal among men of Greek birth.
The
fact that a large portion of every male Greek's educational and recreational life was devoted to physical training
and exercise made him a very knowledgeable spectator at
the competitions.
He knew well the standard events, and
probably even had some personal experience performing
them, at least on the level of recreational exercises.
Most importantly, it can readily be assumed that he was
also knowledgeable as to who were the "star" athletes,
especially the local star or stars who would represent the
spectator's own polis at the Olympic Games.
In the same manner that many of the spectators were
aware of the events through some personal experience, they
were also aware of the intensive training and struggle to
which athletes of Olympic caliber had subjected themselves.
Watching athletes boldly accept the risk of injury or
death to attempt to prove their own superiority, to bring
glory to their home poleis, and to honor the gods was to
the spectators exciting, heroic, and certainly dramatic
73
-
-----------~------------------------~!
and entertaining.
The spectators participated in the festival in different ways.
They were there for all five days.
They
witnessed all of the religious rituals that preceded the
competitions and formed a group with the officials and the
other participants that communally worshipped and honored
Zeus.
That was one of the reasons that they were there.
According to Gardiner, "it was the national religious
festival of the whole Greek race."
25
Although this was
essentially a religious festival, the games themselves had
. .
.
. f.
no re 1 1g1ous
s1gn1
1cance. 26
Men went to Olympia not so
much to honor the gods--this could be done anywhere--as
to witness the contests and to see their favorite athletes.
27
In the athletic competitions the spectators
participated in no other way than to be a passive audience.
They had no role in determining the sequence of
events nor of determining the outcome.
Their involvement
in the competitions, if any, was merely vicarious.
This
is especially true of the later, professionalized games.
The old games, in which all competed in
friendly and honorable rivalry, gave place
to professional displays, in which victory
was too often bought and sold, where .an
unathletic crowd could enjoy the excitement
of sport by proxy.28
During the lifetime of the ancient Olympic Games, the
stadium was relocated twice.
Both times these moves were
74
made to accommodate the growing number of spectators and
~ to provide them with a better vie\'/ of the competitions. 2 9
The schedule of events, however, was not designed for the
spectators' convenience.
The equestrian events were held
, in the nearby Hippodrome, and the spectators had to move
quickly from place to place if they were to see
everything~
In addition to the sporting events, there were many
other activities competing for the spectator's attention.
Many of the great men of Greece--the literary giants,
philosophers, artists, kings, ex-Olympians, military
heroes, the politically ambitious--showed up at Olympia to
meet, to watch the games, and especially to be seen by the
huge assembly of Greeks there.
the spectators' needs.
Booths were erected for
In addition to their hero athletes,
"beggars, hucksters, mountebanks, and fortune tellers all
flocked in as at Epsom on Derby Day.
Even historians and
professors took the opportunity to exhibit their wisdom
to the public."
30
The physical site itself created a diversion that
competed against the athletic competitions for the audiences' attention.
Olympia was the oldest and most famous
. Greece. 31
sanctuary 1n
To most of the spectators, just
the opportunity of seeing and being at this legendary
spot must have counted heavily in their decision to attend
the games.
The setting was pastoral with groves of trees
75
and a view of the slow moving river Alpheus.
Long before
the institution of the games there had been a sanctuary
at Olympia, and throughout the festival's existence
architectural improvements and adornments were continually
made.
The sanctuary itself, known as the Altis, was en-
closed by a wall which separated, it from the stadium, and
'
access to it was gained through three passage ways in this
wall.
Inside the walls were altars to Hera and Zeus.
In
the fifth century B.C., the most famous building in the
Altis was constructed--the great temple of Zeus.
Besides
the many marble sculptures decorating the building's
pediments and depicting mythical stories such as the
chariot race between Oenomaus and Pelops, there was a huge
statue of Zeus sculpted by the famous artist Phidias.
Al-
though only poor copies of this giant statue exist,
Pausanaus described it as a gigantic figure of the god
holding a chryselephantine Nike in his right hand and his
scepter in his left.
The throne and base of the statue
were decorated with mythical scenes featuring gods, daemons, and heroes in gold, ebony, and precious stones.
32
Inside the sanctuary were other altars to lesser gods, and.
the grounds were littered with the many well-kept statues
of, and erected by, the victorious athletes of by-gone
Olympiads.
Outside of the Altis were buildings designed
by famous architects to house priests and dignitaries as
76
- ----
well as the athletes.
----~--------
-------~------~-----]
There were also numerous sit-down
and communal baths, a pool for swimming, and a palaestra
and gymnasion for training.
This hallowed and historical
place was itself a model of the best in Greek visual arts,
and recent excavations there have unearthed an abundance
of art treasures.
In the Hippodrome was a work of art
that also functioned as an integral part of the equestrian
competitions.
This gigantic structure consisted of large
mechanical sculptures of an eagle and a dolphin.
These
two sculptures would be alternately raised and lowered,
signaling the start of the horse or chariot races.
The
exact workings of this complex object are unknown, but
historians agree that its function, other than to signal
the starts of these races to the most distantly situated
spectators, was mainly spectacular.
33
The spectator's stake in these contests, in terms of
personal, physical discomfort, was so little as to be
negligible.
However, the spectators' stake in the final
outcome of these athletic competitions was indeed very
important, at least to the spectators themselves.
A vic-
tory by an athlete was also a victory for his home polis.
A victor was always announced by his own name, his
father's name, and the name of the polis which he represented.
The rivalry that existed between poleis was
fierce, and a victory honored not only the victorious
77
athletes but, by association, all the citizens of his
particular polis.
Naturally this greatly increased the·
spectator's excitement and emotional involvement in a way
very similar, although probably more intensely, to modern
sports fans who cheer on their favorite athletes who are
playing for their state, city or school.
More intensely
because to the ancient Greek, athletic competitions were
never really separated from their religious origins.
They
believed that for an athlete to be victorious he had to be
aided by. a god; and thus a victory at Olympia not only
displayed an athlete's (and his home polis') physical
superiority, but his favor among the gods.
Thus the polis
felt itself blessed with this same godly favor, which in
part justified the great honors and possibly riches which
the polis bestowed upon a favorite son returning victorious from the games.
This interest in the outcome of the
competitions was most visible among the official missions
that represented each competing polis but was also a major
motivation for attending the festival for the many independent travelers.
This created a primary source of the
drama inherent in these competitions.
Events/Performance
Although there were a great number of activities at
· the Olympic festival that competed for the spectator's
---------------·---------
-----~-----
---
--
______________________________ ____________j
78
- -------- -----~------~----------~------
--------~----
-------- ------
-----·--:----~~----------·
.,
I
attention and could be seen as diverting and entertaining,
the ones that will be analyzed in this section will be
exclusively the athletic
competi~ions.
This is not be-
cause these other activities were not entertaining, but
rather that the athletic contests were the only activities
expressly performed by the athletes, or performers, and
thus constituted the performance as spelled out in our
definition.
The other activities were either peripheral,
incidental events that certainly added to the spectacle,
or the purely religious rituals that, while again making
up a part of the general spectacle, were not really entertainment according to this definition on grounds of intention or perception.
The athletic competitions that will
be discussed here will be the basic events of Greek athletics:
running, wrestling, boxing, pancration, chariot
racing, and the pentathlon which included jumping and
throwing the diskos and javelin.
It hai been noted that
as the Olympic Games evolved, new events were added.
But
these later additions will not be included in this analysis because they were merely variations of the originals,
changing the distance or duration of an event or providing
for different classes of athletes.
Examples of these
would include the long distance run, boxing for boys, and
chariot races for different ages or numbers of horses.
These additions and variations did not change the original
'
79
events' basic theatrical character, and so, with the
exception of a specific case or two which might have some
theatrical significance, these will not be taken as separ-·
ate events requiring separate analysis.
Likewise, the
events that will be discussed will be taken together as a
single performance unit except in the case of a specific
event that might have particular relevance to any of the
analytical questions which might be posed.
In the case of
most of these events, a detailed description will not be
necessary as it is the event's theatricality that concerns
this study.
The athletic competitions took place in the stadium
or, in the case of the equestrian events, in the Hippodrome, both of which were located nearby but outside of
the walled sanctuary.
The stadium was a flat, wide, rec-
tangular area approximately 600 feet long.
This distance
was predetermined by the Greeks as the appropriate length
for a foot race, allowing the runners to comfortably reach
their top speed.
34
Although all of the contests except
for the equestrian events took place in the stadium, it
was designed solely to accommodate the one stade (600ft.)
foot race.
This is possibly because in the days when
this festival was only local and of no Panhellenic importance, running at this distance was probably the only
competition.
The distance of one stade was marked by
80
posts at either end of the stadium, and races of greater
lengths made a turn around the far post and the runners
came back.
Even the long distance racers stayed in the
stadium, making their way up and back until the race's
distance had been covered.
Thus, even the long distance
race was continually kept in the view of the spectators.
The Hippodrome, like the stadium, was a flat, level,
open space with two pillars at the ends.
One of these
marked the start and the finish, and the other was the
post around which the horses and chariots made their
turns.
The Hippodrome was quite a bit larger than the
stadium, with each complete lap being about four stades
long.
The course was divided from post to post by a wall
which prevented any accidental moving over into the on.
.com.1.ng
tra ff..1.c. 35
The sequence of the events at Olympia changed somewhat from time to time as did the nature and the lengths
of the events.
But on the basis of historical and arche-
ological evidence, it is possible to accurately reconstruct the athletic program as it
fourth century B.C.
36
prob~bly
existed in the
The first day was filled by religi-
ous rituals that inaugurated the festival, .including the
oath taken by the athletes.
The second day was devoted to
competitions for boys in running, wrestling, boxing and
the pancration.
The morning of the third day was given
-
---·
-~------ ---~---------·----------~
81
over to the equestrian events with the pentathlon occupying the afternoon.
The fourth day saw the adult competi-
tions in running, wrestling, boxing, the pancration, and
the hoplite race.
Then, on the fifth and final day, the
prizes were awarded, and the official and private banquets
were held.
37
Of the five day festival only three days
were occupied by athletic competitions.
c~rned
We are here con-
with the theatrical or dramatic nature produced by
the sequence of events during these three days.
Starting
off with the boys' events on the first day of competitions
provided a good "warm-up" and a sample of the more serious
competition of the next two days.
The festival's third
day (the second day of competition) contained the most
popular events of the festival, the exciting and spectacular chariot races.
These events, with the ever present
possibility of danger were always popular with the spectators.
The pentathlon, also held on this day, was another
extremely popular contest, and a victor in this event was
very highly re·garded as being a prime example of balanced
physical development.
This event consisted of jumping,
and the throwing of the diskos and the javelin--three
events that did not occur independently of the pentathlon
--plus running and wrestling.
This "five events in one"
contest was popular not only because it involved so many
athletes competing in five different contests for a single
82
prize, nor because the victor was seen as the best all-·
around athlete.
The popularity of this event also stem-
med from the nature of its internal structure.
It is not
known how this event was scored or in what order four of
the contests were held.
But it is known that these con-
tests were eliminations and that the final contest was
wrestling.
Here the two athletes remaining after all the
others were eliminated were pitted against each other,
using both their brains as well as all of the muscles in
their bodies to grapple for victory and the prize.
This
final confrontation must have been extremely dramatic.
The following day was devoted to the less spectacular
but more traditional sporting events.
The one stade race
was the most prestigious event at the Olympic Games.
Olympiads were always recorded by their number and by the
·name of the victor in this event.
Whether this harks back
to a tradition in which running was the only event at
Olympia is not known for sure, but that the one stade
race was the most important event is certain.
The other
events of the fourth day were all very popular but showed
no specific dramatic
possibil~ties
aside from those inher-
ent in all forms of athletic competition.
But the con-
tests of this final day of competition concluded with an
event that by its nature and its position in the program
must have produced a somewhat gloomy and portentious
83
feeling in the spectators.
This was the hoplite race.
Although the armor that was worn by the competitors was
minimal and only symbolically represented real battle
armor, this event must have reminded the audience of the
martial nature of athletics, and of the realities and the
rivalries that existed in the world outside of the festival.
This event symbolically heralded the end of the
sacred truce, although in practice the truce was in effect
until the athletes and the spectators arrived home.
It
can be assumed that the program was arranged in order to
enhance the festival's dramatic effect.
This does not
mean that the organizers were only interested in the
festival's entertainment value.
Even if this festival is
seen as a solely religious ritual, it would not exclude
the organizers' desire to hold the spectators' attention.
One reason that this assumption can be made is that no
other explanation for the carefully planned sequence of
events has been offered.
The very nature of this sequence
shows that it was not produced randomly, and the fact that
the program underwent slight changes from Olympiad to
Olympiad leads one to suspect that the organizers were
trying to find the sequence of events that would best present its dramatic possibilities.
It might be argued that
staging two of the festival's most dramatic and spectacular events, the pentathlon and the chariot races, before
the more traditional and possibly more mundane events
84
would be
ant~-climactic,
and therefore provides evidence
that the organizers had no dramatic intentions in the se-·
quence of events.
This may have been true of later Roman
audiences to whom spectacle was everything.
But to the
ancient Greek audience, who certainly enjoyed the spectacu-·
lar and exciting events, it was the traditional events that
were pure and noble and heroic, and were therefore of the
greatest interest and importance.
It was the anticipation
of these contests that drew men from all over Greece to
Olympia and that made them stay there for the full five
days of the festival.
Due to the large number of competing athletes and the
limitations of time and space, the performances ran fairly
continuously.
Matching of contestants was done by lots,
and most of the contests were eliminations.
Thus, a vic-
torious athlete had probably competed in several matches to
win a single event.
The only time he had to rest was be-
tween his eliminating heats.
The rules for each event were
strict and infractions were rare.
The outcome was a fair
indication of who was the superior athlete.
The possible
exception to this would be in cases in which an athlete
might
be matched by lot with another of unequal size or
weight; or by the random nature of the eliminating heats an
athlete might be required to compete a second time before
he was rested and restored to his actual potential.
The
85
outcome was never prescripted nor the action choreographed.
The spectators witnessed fair contests in which the action
was immediate and from which the drama emanated spontaneously.
Any form of physical exercise bears a practical
relationship to real life.
Physical exercise stimulates
and develops the muscles and organs which make life
poss~
ible and is therefore a fundamental necessity of life.
Athletic competition was a highly stylized form of physical
exercise, and the competitions at Olympia were the highest
manifestations of a popular pastime and the ultimate celebration of the healthy body and physical achievement.
As
a presentation, the Garnes offered a view of unadorned and
unaided athletes testing their physical abilities in nonscripted and unrehearsed competitions.
These contests were
"real" in that there was no artifice in terms of costumes,
props, stage settings, texts, or any literary or theatrical
conventions to create the illusion that these activities
were anything other than what they were.
Some other events at the Olympic Garnes which had some
relationship to real life were those most obviously warlike.
Of course deciding which of these events most
closely related to military activities depended upon who
was perceiving the contests.
The Spartans thought of all
athletic activities, including dancing, as preparation for
86
war.
·Boxing and wrestling are "fighting," but the two
events that were most visibly vestiges of military activities were the javelin throw and the hoplite race.
The
javelin was a spear thrown for both distance and accuracy.
The hoplite race was instituted partially to meet the
demands of certain parties who criticized athletics in
general for their lack of practical usefulness.
The char-
iot race was a remnant of military practices, but by the
fourth century the chariots used for racing had been developed for that particular function and were clearly
distin~
guishable from the chariots used for war.
It is impossible to say whether athletic competitions
evolved from physical exercise or if physical exercises
developed out of the popularity of athletic competitions.
Either way, for the ancient Greek physical exercise was an
everyday, "real life" activity.
Physical exercise served
several practical functions including maintaining the
health and well being of the populace and giving vent to
idle energies.
But organized competition, when put into
the context of a religious festival with thousands of spectators looking on, no longer served any practical functioni
it was a show, a form of entertainment.
However, when
compared to other contemporary forms of entertainment-most notably Greek drama where the performers wore stylized
masks to disguise themselves, declaimed metrically
87
structured verses that described the thoughts and actions
of long dead heroes and mythical characters, and employed
a vast array of theatrical conventions to forward a predetermined story--the athletic·competitions held at Olympia
snowed a very close relationship to real life.
CHAPTER VI
CONCLUSION
The ancient Olympic Games were clearly a form of
popular entertainment.
They are easily reduced into the
stipulated elements of our definition, and these three
elements, the performer/athlete, audience/spectators, and
performance/athletic events, have been analyzed in terms of
their theatrical qualities.
But the extent to which this
festival differs or compares to more traditional theatrical
·activities deserves some additional comment.
One of the most obvious kinships that this entertainment form has with many other more traditional, or more
readily accepted entertainment forms, lies in its basic
formal structure.
That is, it was a presentation, a show.
Despite the intentions of those Greeks who originated this
festival, the activities were conducted in the presence of
a group that were in attendance with the sole purpose of
watching what occurred there.
It is evident that this
group was considered an important part of the festival by
the organizers from the very fact that large areas were
provided solely for the viewers' accommodation from the
earliest of times.
If this was only a religious ritual or
a military exercise, a group of spectators, except for
maybe priests or military or political leaders, would not
really be necessary and possibly not even welcomed or
88
89
'
permitted to attend.
There are many performance activi-
ties, such as music, dance, and even athletics that can be
performed recreationally without an audience present.
But
the choice to include an audience greatly transforms the
activity, although the intentions of the performers or
the nature of the performance does not necessarily change
at all.
Throughout the Olympic Games' long history the
spectators were always included and formed an integral and
important group.
And it was their presence that made the
festival a show.
In most traditional theatrical or entertainment forms,
two of the major elements, the performer and the audience,
interact in that the performer consciously presents the
performance to the audience who consciously sees the performance as presented to it for its sake; to provide
diversion, amusement, excitement, or emotional stimulation.
This applies to actors, musicians, singers, dan-
cers, and a number of other types of performers.
At the
Olympic Games the performer was the athlete.
It is possible that an athlete did not consciously
see himself as a performer as his primary intention was
to defeat his opponents and thereby prove to himself and
those opponents his physical superiority, rather than to
provide entertainment for the ever-present group of spectators.
This is especially true of the festival's early
'
90
years when the competing athletes were almost exclusively
from the aristocracy, who were all-around health enthusiasts and competed primarily for their own satisfaction.
It was, however, the spectators that formed the group most
important to the study of the Olympic Games as popular
entertainment.
Of course, as time went on, the athlete,
who.could not have possibly been unaware of the spectators, became increasingly cognizant of the adoration he
could get from the audience and of the honors and of the
material gains that could be obtained from it after he
had been victorious at Olympia.
Therefore, the athlete
also began to perceive of himself as a performer, performing for an audience.
Possibly, an athlete in the age of
amateurism did not see himself as a performer as exclusively as did the spectators.
By the time athletes became
professionalized, they saw themselves just as the audience
did, as performers--talented, highly trained, and skilled
showmen.
Although it was probably not the primary inten-
tion of the festival's founders, as the Olympic Games
evolved, its theatrical nature--in terms of a performer
consciously presenting a performance to an audience who
consciously sees that performance as given for its
entertainment--also evolved until its theatrical pattern
more closely resembled traditional entertainment forms.
Although the Olympic Games can clearly be perceived as
91
popular entertainment from their inception, as time moved
on the changes that were made in the Garnes led to an
ev~n
greater "theatricality" in the more traditional sense of
that. word.
The Olympic Garnes differed from most theatrical
activities in that the athletic events which made up the
performance were never scripted, choreographed, annotated,
or in any other fashion written down or predetermined.
Each event did have its own sometimes complex set of
rules, but these merely provided a framework for each
particular expression of athletic endeavor, and assured
as fair and as sportsmanlike an atmosphere for the contests as possible.
The order: in which the events ·occurred
was prearranged, but that had no bearing whatsoever upon
the playing out of the contest's internal drama, which,
_with the exception of the few guidelines imposed by the
rules, developed spontaneously with each new contest or
contestant.
The drama that is inherent in any athletic contest has
been referred to before and requires some explanation
here.
In any athletic activity there is some amount of
struggle and pain for the athlete.
If he has set a goal
for himself, in terms of physical development, and has
set out to achieve this goal through a struggle ennobled
by his singleness of mind, dedication to his struggle,
92
and the heroic conquering of his doubts and physical pain
by the power of his will, then, in this there is some
drama.
Whether or not he attains his goal is of no matter.
It is, to an audience, the ability to relate to or to
understand this struggle, and moreover the anticipation of
the athlete's success or failure that is truely dramatic.
If the activity is an athletic contest the drama is
greatly increased.
In a competition or contest there are
at least two athletes pitted against each other.
Their
performances may occur simultaneously or alternately, but
the competing athletes have not only their own personal
goal to achieve but also have the performances of other
competitors to better.
The dramatic effects are not only
multiplied by the number of contestants but also by the
spectators' anticipation of the level of performance
that will be necessary to prove which
is best.
s~ngle
competitor
It must be remembered that a single athlete can
set the level of his own goals, but when in competition
against other athletes no one, athletes or spectators,
knows for sure where the goal will be and what sort of .
performance will prove necessary to meet it.
And so an
athletic competition is a very dramatic activity.
Certain
tests could no doubt be devised that could more accurately
meter an athlete's abilities, but these would never match
the drama or possibly have the theatricality of live,
93
man-to-man competitions.
Even in modern times, when we
possess the technology to easily measure an athlete's
ability under controlled, scientific conditions and arrive
at a quantitive value that could be compared to like
values for athletes around the world, this is not done.
Numbers may be interesting but they are not exciting.
Modern athletes travel the world over to compete directly
against other athletes.
cally, is an anachronism.
This, when looked at scientifiBut it is also theatrical;
\'lhether it is done to entertain or perhaps to dramatize a
more pragmatic statement.
The ancient Greeks did not have
the technology to prove athletic superiority in any manner
more scientific than competition, but they were certainly
aware of the dramatic value of competition.
imagin~
One can
of the general public--except for some dev6tees--
that nothing would seem more boring than watching an
athlete, even if that athlete is known to be among the
best trained and most skilled in the world, exercising
alone.
And thus physical exercise developed into games to
make the exercising more interesting and the games became
competitions that were dramatic and were presented theatrically at the Olympic Games.
As the Olympic Games evolved they changed in a number
of ways.
But considering the long period of time during
which the Games lasted, these changes were relatively few
94
and minor.
As far as the purely religious activities are
concerned, there were no real changes from the festival 1 s
beginnings.
The number and the sequence of the actual
athletic events changed somewhat but, as has been stated
before, these changes were modifications of the already
existing events which were made to cater to public tastes.
The athletes themselves changed the least.
Although their
initial motivations changed--as to whether they competed
for prizes of glory and self-satisfaction or prizes of
material value--their function as performers and how they
were seen by the spectators changed very little.
The
group that showed the most change during the history of
the Olympic Games was the audience--the spectators.
This
change was not in who they were or in their social or
economic backgrounds, but in their attitudes.
And it is
their attitude, their perception of this festival that
permits this event to be seen as popular entertainment:
by their very inclusion in the festival, and by their
capability, willingness, or desire to be diverted, amused,
and entertained by this event.
The term "popular" entertainment implies that the
audience or the people who are observing such an activity
are of the first importance.
This differentiates popular
entertainment from other forms of entertainment in which
the most important element would be a literary text or
95
perhaps a musical composition, and also forms which might
feature a performer such as a solo musician, a dancer, or
perhaps an actor doing improvisations.
These forms are
often seen as more "serious" or artistic than popular
entertainments.
They probably are more artistic as they
result from the efforts of individual artists--playwrights,
composers, choreographers, or "artistes."
As far as popu-
lar entertainments being less than "serious", it seems
difficult to see any entertainment form, or p9ssibly any
art form for that matter, to actually have a "serious"
function in real life.
ageless.
But the debate over that point is
There are perhaps, too many examples of popular
entertainment that are, due to this prejudice, frequently
overlooked in our studies of "serious" theatrical art.
This is extremely unfortunate as a study of many forms of
popular entertainment can probably reveal a great deal of
information useful to the study of artistic theatrical
expression.
Hopefully, this study of the ancient Olympic
Garnes as a form of popular entertainment has provided some
fresh insight into that enigmatic human desire and need to
be entertained, educated, or simply diverted from the
oppressions of everyday life.
And these are the basic
motivations for all theatrical expression.
96
NOTES
Chapter I
1
Nicholas Yalouris, ed. , The Olympic Games . (Athens:
Edetika Athenon, S.A., 1975}, p. 8.
2
3
Yalouris, p. 8.
Will Durant, The Life of Greece (New York: Simon
and Schuster, 1939), p. 211.
4
Homer, The Iliad of Homer, trans. Ennis Rees
(Indianapolis:
The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc.,
1977~},
All of book 23 deals with the funeral games of Patroclus.
5
Pindar, The Odes of Pindar, trans. Richmond
La·ttimore (Chicago:
The University of Chicago Press,
19 4 7 ) , pp . 1- 55 .
6
Edward Norman Gardiner, Greek Athletic Sports and
Festivals (London:
7
Macmillan, 1910); p. 61.
h K1eran,
.
Jon
Th e Story o f
776 B.C. - 1956 A.D.
(New York:
h
. Games:
t.e
01
ymp1c
J. B. Kippencott Company,
1957}, p. 12.
8
9
World,
Yalouris, p. 106.
Edward Norman Gardiner, Athletics of the Ancient
(Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1930), p. 222.
96
97
10 Donna Kurtz, Greek Burial Customs (New York:
Cornell University Press, 1971), p. 202.
11
F. M. Cornford, "Origins of the Olympic Garnes"
in Jane E. Harrison, Thernis:
A Study of the Social
Origins of Greek Religion (Cleveland:
The World Publish-
ing Company, 1962), p. 216.
12 John S
. L'f
(B os t on:
car b oroug h , F ace t s o f H. e 11 enLc
1 e
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1976), p. 80.
Chapter II
1
c.
(Oxford:
2
E. Robinson, Everyday Life in Ancient Greece
The Clarendon Press, 1933), p. 111.
Edward Norman Gardiner, Athletics of the Ancient
World (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1930}, p. 27.
3 H. D. F. Kitto, The Greeks (Middlesex, England:
Penguin Books, 1951), p. 173.
4
Werner Jaegar, Paideia:
The Ideals of Greek
Culture; trans. Gilbert Highet (New York:
Oxford Univer-
sity Press, 1939), p. 205.
5
6
7
8
9
Durant, p. 211.
Yalouris, p. 148.
Jaegar, p. 208.
Robinson, p. 31.
John Scarborough, Facets of Hellenic Life (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1976), p. 5.
98
10
11
Robinson, p. 32.
Sir Maurice Bowra, The Greek Experience (New York:
The New American Library, 1959), p. 13.
12
13
Bowra, p. 13.
Kathleen Freeman, Greek City-States (New York:
W. W. Norton & Company, 1950), p. 20.
14
15
16
Bowra, p. 13.
Durant, p. 211.
Robinson, p. 111.
17 Robert Flaceliere, Daily Life in Greece (New York:
The Macmillan Company, 1959), p. 90.
18
.
Thomas Woody, Life and Education in Early
Societies (New York:
The Macmillan Company, 1959),
p. 300.
19
20
21
22
Flaceliere, p. 94.
Durant, p. 289.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 58.
Robinson, p. 111.
ent ages.
Other authorities give differ-
Thomas Woody says seven to eleven and eleven to
fifteen, p. 308.
23
24
25
26
Woody, p. 302.
Woody, p. 308.
Durant, p. 289.
Edward Norman Gardiner, Greek Athletic Sports and
Festivals (London:
Macmillan, 1910), p. 99.
99
27
Woody, p. 311.
28
Jaegar, p. 31.
29
Gardiner,
'30
p. 101.
Woody, p. 246.
31
32
Athletic~,
Woody, p. 241.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 28.
Chapter III
1
Donna C. Kurtz, Greek Burial Customs (~ew York:
Cornell University Press, 1971), p. 202.
2
3
4
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 31.
Freeman, p. 20.
v1oody, p. 221.
5 H. W. Parke, Festivals of the Athenians (New York:
Cornell University Press, 1977), p. 17.
6
7
8
Parke, p. 13.
Robinson, p. 134.
Robinson, p. 134.
9 Robinson, p. 134.
10
11
12
Kurtz, p. 131.
Robinson, p. 135.
Kurtz, p. 3 31.
-13 Kurtz , p. 2 0 2.
14
Emile Mireaux, Daily Life.in the Time of Homer
(Toronto, Ontario:
The Macmillan Company, 1969), p. 230.
100
15
Homer, The Iliad of Homer, trans. Ennis Rees
(Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1977). All
of Book 23 deals with the funeral of Patroclus.
16
York:
Francois Chamoux, The Civilization of Greece (New
Simon and Schuster, 1965), p. 239.
17
18
19
Kurtz, p. 202.
Kurtz, p. 202.
E. 0. James, Seasonal Feasts and Festivals (New
York: Barnes & Noble, 1961), p. 133.
20
Morton Smith, The Ancient Greeks (New York:
Cornell University Press, 1960)
21
James, p. 135.
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
Mireaux, p. 228.
Yalouris, p. 36.
James, p. 134.
James, p. 133.
Mireaux, p. 228.
James, p. 143.
Mireaux, p. 229.
Mireaux, p. 228.
James, pp. 143-145.
Kitto p. 247.
James, p. 152.
Parke , p . 3 3 .
1
p. 16.
101
34
Games were founded at Delphi in 583 B.C.,
followed by the Isthmian games in 581 B.C., and the
Nemean games in 573 B.C.
35
36
James, p. 152.
37
Parke, p. 35
38
James, p. 152.
39
Parke, p. 36.
40
Parke, p. 37.
41
42
Parke, pp. 33-34.
Parke, p. 39.
James, p. 153
43
Parke, p. 37.
Chapter IV
1
2
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 37.
Nicholas Yalouris, ed., The Olympic Games (Athens:
Edetika Athenon S.A., 1975), p. 36.
3
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 37.
At the Isthmian Games
pine bows were used and at the Pythian Games laurel
branches.
The vines of the wild celery bush were formed
into the crowns for the Nemean festival, and at Olympia
the sole prize was a wreath of wild olive branches.
4
M. J. Finley, The Ancient Greeks (New York: The
Viking Press, 1963), p. 35.
102
5 John Kieran, The Story of the Olympic Games (New
York: J. B. Lippencott Company, 1957), p. 3.
6
7
8
9
Finley, p. 37.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 38.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 34
Pausanias, in Ancient Greece, ed. Truesdell S.
Brown (New York: The Free Press, 1955), p. 255.
10
Harper's Dictionary of Classical Literature and
Antiquities, ed. Harry Thurston Peck (New York: Cooper
Square Publishers, Inc., 1965).
11
12
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p.
38~
Mark Morford, Classical Mythology (New York: David
McKay Company, Inc., 1977), p. 360.
13
14
Pausanias, p. 256.
Robert Payne, Ancient Greece (New York: W. W.
Norton Company, Inc., 1964), pp. 129-130.
15
16
17
18
19
Kurtz, P• 242.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 38.
Payne, p. 130.
Mireaux, p. 230.
F. M. Cornford, "Origins of the Olympic Games," in
Jane E. Harrison, Themis: A Study of the Social Origins of
Greek Religion (Cleveland: The World Publishing Company,
1962), p. 214.
20
. Cornford, p. 214.
103
21
2.2
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
Cornford, p. 216.
Robinson, p. 116.
Scarborough, p. 80.
Mireaux, p. 230.
Mireaux, p. 238.
Yalouris, p. 134.
Parke, p. 22.
Mireaux, ·p. 235.
Pausanias, p. 256.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 31.
Gardiner, Athletics, pp. 33-34.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, P· 38.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 34.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 35.
Jaegar, p. 207.
James G. Thompson, "Sport, Athletics and Gym-
nastics in Ancient Greece"
(Diss., Pennsylvania State
University, 1971), p. 117.
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
Thompson, p. 117.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 61.
Flaceliere, p. 211.
Flaceliere, p. 211.
Mireaux, p. 194.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 54.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 59.
104
44
45
46
Pausanias, p. 259.
Gardiner, Athletics, pp. 70-71.
George Thomson, Studies in Ancient Greek Society
(New York: The Citadel Press, 1965)
47
48
Yalouris, p. 106.
51
52
57
58
59
60
Kieran, p. 6.
Yalouris, p. 110.
53
56
Flaceliere, p. 220.
Kieran, p. 6.
50
55
p. 62.
Yalouris, p. 106.
49
54
1
Kieran, p. 6.
Yalouris, p. 106.
Yalouris, p. 108.
Flaceliere, p. 211.
Durant, p. 213.
Durant, p. 214.
Durant, p. 211.
Payne, p. 131.
61 Gardiner , ·
Athletics, p. 103.
62
63
Flaceliere, p. 211.
Kieran, p. 13.
Chapter V
1
ment:
Heinrich R. Falk, "Popular Theatre and EntertainFramework for a Methodology," unpublished paper,
105
California State University, Northridge, no date.
The
definition of popular entertainment was suggested in this
essay.
Falk also suggests a number of questions to be
' posed to analyze the three elements of popular entertainment stipulated by the definition.
Some of the proposed
questions do not directly pertain to
popular entertainment.
thi~
specific form of
However many do or can be adjusted
to do so, and these, along with any new questions that
might arise from the study of the Olympic Games will be
applied in this thesis.
2
3
4
5
6
7
Durant, p. 214.
Yalouris, p. 112.
Durant, p. 211.
Jaegar, p. 207.
Kieran, p. 10
c.
A. Manning, "Professionalism in Greek Athletics,"
The Classical Weekly, 11, no. lc,
(Dec. 17, 1917), pp.
74-78.
8
9
10
11
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 103.
Jaegar, p. 144.
Harris, p. 13.
Heinz Schobel, The Ancient Olympic Games (New York:
D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., 1966), p. 56.
12
.
. Anclen
. t Greece ( New
Ro b ert F 1 ace 1 elre,
Love ln
York: Crown Publishers, 1962), p. 29.
106
13 Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 2.
14
15
!4anning, p. 76.
Jaegar, p.
16 Kitto, p. 173.
17
18
of
Kieran, p. 10.
Lewis Richard Farnell, Greek Hero Cults and Ideas
Iw~ortali~
(Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1933),
p. 365.
19
Bill Henry, History of the Olympic Garnes (New
York: G. F. Putnam's Sons, 1976), p. 16.
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
Henry, p. 13 .
Manning, p. 75.
Kitto, p. 248.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 100.
Yalouris, p. 109.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 222.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 103.
Durant, p. 211.
Gardiner, Greek Sports, p. 4.
Yalouris, p. 156-57.
Robinson, p. 116.
Yalouris, p. 88
Yalouris, p. 98.
Gardiner, Athletics, p. 227.
Yalouris, p. 156.
107
35
36
37
Yalouris, p. 232.
Yalouris, p. 128.
Yalouris, pp. 128-133.
108
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