The sun doesn’t always shine in Greece. Yesterday there were a few showers when we were at Olympia.
I don’t think you want to read a disquisition about the site and museum any more than I want to write it. So my plan is to pass on some of the things Georgia told us that I found of interest. The games were initiated around 750 BC when the constant wars between Athenians, Spartans and the rest was becoming a problem. Two kings went to the oracle at Delphi and were advised that friendly athletic competition under a truce would bring the Panhellenic world together. Hitherto the games at Olympia had been strictly a local derby.
The games were conducted over just five days but the truce was for some three months. Six weeks before the games, held in July or August dependent on the moon, heralds (in groups of three) were sent to all the Greeks living around the Mediterranean declaring the truce and announcing the date of the games. The ethos of the games was to encourage competition but in a state of grace. There were temples and sacrifices and a side show of philosophers teaching and talking. The events were only open to men, although later women were allowed one day of races, and the men competed kit off. The most important event was a foot-race run over 192 metres, the length of the stadium. The winners were immortalised in bronze statues and gained much respect. The also rans didn’t count and were ignored.
The games were to be played fairly but as still happens there was some rigging and, if discovered, the miscreants were also depicted in bronze as a mark of shame and their cities banned from participating for the next two games, held as now every four years.
The museum, adjacent to the site, is remarkable in many respects but I have exceeded 300 words and will keep it short.
“Found during excavations at the temple of Hera in 1877. The messenger of the gods, charged by Zeus to take the infant Dionysos to the Nymphs, who were to nurse him, rests on the way having thrown his cloak over a tree trunk. In his raised right arm he was probably holding a bunch of grapes, a symbol associated with the future god of wine. Dionysos reaches out for it.
The sculptor brought out the beauty of the figure by expressing the Olympian serenity of the god’s face and the harmony of his body. The highly polished surface adds to the graceful and soft characteristics of the art of Praxiteles.” (Archaeological Museum of Olympia)
There are some who are less enthusiastic. The sculptor Aristide Maillol opined, “It’s kitsch, it’s frightful, it’s sculpted in Marseille soap”.
The games were instrumental in bringing peace and unity to the Panhellenic world enabling the Greeks to defend themselves with mixed results against the Persians.