Page 67 - All About History - Issue 53-17

Ancient Olympics

it”. Transported to Constantinople by rapacious make this sacrifice, was praised for something who could not afford to stay at the Leonidaion
Romans, the statue was destroyed by fire in 462, altogether more prosaic. Legend told that thanks — a ‘hotel’ built by a far-sighted entrepreneur in
but we can still appreciate its power: Byzantine to his sacrifice to the very specifically named 360 BCE — pitched tents or slept rough outside
iconographers used it as their model for the face Zeus Who-Banishes-Flies, Zeus Apomuios, he the sanctuary with little running water and no
of God. caused Olympia to be fly-free. sanitation, a jostling mêlée of increasingly rank
Meanwhile, a stone’s throw from Zeus’ temple Spectators had good reason to be thankful, bodies. For some, such as Epictetus, the abiding
to the north, Pelops’ grave-mound was the site especially since the Games were celebrated in the memory was “the sunburn and the filth… the
of one of the festival’s most solemn ceremonies, scorching heat of August, when conditions could cacophony, the din, the jostling, the shoving, the
when a black ram was sacrificed to the dead be horrendous. For the five days surrounding the crowding, and so many people, each absorbed
hero, while Heracles, said to be the first to new moon, those tens of thousands of spectators, in doing his own thing”. However, even he

The Sanctuary of Olympia in the 2nd Century

Bristling with statues of victorious athletes, Olympia was dominated by the marble-roofed Temple of Zeus. Beyond Pelops’ grave-mound, the original wooden columns of the Temple of Hera (700
BCE) were gradually replaced in stone, while to the northeast the stadium was separated from the sanctuary by an artificial rise.

Philippeion Temple of Hera Zanes statues Stadium To Hippodrome
Built to This 7th Century BCE Overlooked by a row of Races on the packed-earth track, The 180m-long Hippodrome,
commemorate Philip temple housed an archaic temple-like treasuries, 180m in length (the distance scene of the thrilling horse- and
II’s victory in battle, statue of the seated the statues were paid the Greeks called a ‘stade’), were chariot-races, was an elliptical
this exquisite rotunda goddess with Zeus for from fines on watched by spectators standing race track. Buried in silt by the
housed statues not standing beside her, and cheating competitors, on the manmade mound flooding River Alpheus, its site
of gods but of the the ‘Discus of Iphitus’, named and shamed surrounding three sides. was not rediscovered until 2008.
Macedonian royal inscribed with the terms on bases which still
family. of the Olympic Truce. survive today.

Grave Mound of Pelops
Surrounded by white poplar trees, here,
beneath the August full moon, priests
slaughtered a ram black ram, letting
its blood soak the earth for the hero’s
ghost to drink.

Pheidias’ Temple of Zeus Stoa of the
Workshop Adorned with exterior Leonidaion Echoes
An exact replica of the sculptures showing This stoa (portico),
interior of Zeus’ Temple mythological scenes, the 73m square and Bouleuterion 90m long, was
(save for the addition of temple housed a 12m-high constructed between 330 begun in the mid
windows), Pheidias created seated statue of Zeus and 320 BCE by Leonidas In this complex of two apsidal buildings 4th Century BCE.
the god’s gold and ivory faced in gold and ivory, of Naxos, this proto-hotel flanking central chamber with a Excellent acoustics
sculpture here before one of the Seven Wonders featured a central courtyard colonnaded frontage, the Olympic Council made it the ideal
assembling it in situ. of the Ancient World. with fragrant shrubs and met, presided over by a forbidding statue setting for contests
splashing fountains. of Zeus Horkios (‘Zeus, Oath God’). between trumpeters.
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