User talk:Senior citizen smith/Ancient Olympic Games

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Chilon

Again, men have placed on an equality with those of the oracles the precepts uttered by Chilon,1 the Lacedæmonian. These have been consecrated at Delphi in letters of gold, and are to the following effect: "That each person ought to know himself, and not to desire to possess too much;"2 and "That misery is the sure companion of debt and litigation." He died of joy, on hearing that his son had been victorious in the Olympic games, and all Greece assisted at his funeral rites.

Pliny the Elder, The Natural History 7.32

Chilon was an old man about the 52nd Olympiad, when Aesop the fabulist was flourishing. According to Hermippus, his death took place at Pisa, just after he had congratulated his son on an Olympic victory in boxing. It was due to excess of joy coupled with the weakness of a man stricken in years. And all present joined in the funeral procession.

I have written an epitaph on him also, which runs as follows:

I praise thee, Pollux, for that Chilon's son

By boxing feats the olive chaplet won.

Nor at the father's fate should we repine;

He died of joy; may such a death be mine.

Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 1.3 (c.300 AD)

Rewards

[Solon] curtailed the honours of athletes who took part in the games, fixing the allowance for an Olympic victor at 500 drachmae, for an Isthmian victor at 100 drachmae, and proportionately in all other cases. It was in bad taste, he urged, to increase the rewards of these victors, and to ignore the exclusive claims of those who had fallen in battle, whose sons ought, moreover, to be maintained and educated by the State.

Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers 1.2

Philip and Alexander

For it was neither every kind of fame nor fame from every source that he courted, as Philip did, who plumed himself like a sophist on the power of his oratory, and took care to have the victories of his chariots at Olympia engraved upon his coins; nay, when those about him inquired whether he would be willing to contend in the foot-race at the Olympic games, since he was swift of foot, ‘Yes,’ said he, ‘if I could have kings as my contestants.’

Plutarch, Alexander 4.5 (c.100 AD)

plutarch alexander, ann birth of alex, same day as won olymp [1]

Beauty

Beauty varies with each age. In a young man, it consists in possessing a body capable of enduring all efforts, either of the racecourse or of bodily strength, while he himself is pleasant to look upon and a sheer delight. This is why the athletes in the pentathlon are most beautiful, because they are naturally adapted for bodily exertion and for swiftness of foot.

Aristotle, Rhetoric 1.5.11 (trans. J. H. Freese, Ed.)

Foundation

But when the Olympic games, after not being held for a long period, were revived by Iphitus, and the Olympic festival was again held, the only prizes offered were for running, and Coroebus won. On the tomb is an inscription that Coroebus was the first man to win at Olympia, and that his grave was made at the end of Elean territory.

Pausanias, Description of Greece 8.26.4

eusebius on polybius 27 previous games

sparta v eleans, arcadians / pisatan rival claim

[2] [3]

There are who joy them in the Olympic strife

And love the dust they gather in the course;

The goal by hot wheels shunn'd, the famous prize,

Exalt them to the gods that rule mankind;

This joys, if rabbles fickle as the wind

Through triple grade of honours bid him rise,

Horace, Odes 1.1 (c.23 BC)

Nero

That no memory or the least monument might remain of any other victor in the sacred Grecian games, he ordered all their statues and pictures to be pulled down, dragged away with hooks, and thrown into the common sewers. He drove the chariot with various numbers of horses, and at the Olympic games with no fewer than ten; though, in a poem of his, he had reflected upon Mithridates for that innovation. Being thrown out of his chariot, he was again replaced, but could not retain his seat, and was obliged to give it up, before he reached the goal, but was crowned notwithstanding.

Suetonius, Nero 24

Deificataion

While still surviving, and in full possession of his senses, by the command of the same oracle, and with the sanction of Jupiter, the supreme Father of the gods, Euthymus, the pugilist, who had always, with one exception, been victorious in the Olympic games, was deified. He was a native of Locri, in Italy. I find that Callimachus, considering it a more wonderful circumstance than any he had ever known, that the two statues which had been erected to him, one at Locri, and the other at Olympia, were struck by lightning on the same day, ordered sacrifices to be offered up to him, which was accordingly done, both during his life-time, and after his death. Nothing, indeed, has appeared to me so remarkable, as this mark of approval given by the gods.

Pliny, The Natural History 7.48

Clitomachus

He was considered to be a quite invincible boxer, and his fame had spread over the whole world, when Ptolemy, ambitious to destroy his reputation, trained with the greatest care and sent off the boxer Aristonicus, a man who seemed to have a remarkable natural gift for this sport. Upon this Aristonicus arriving in Greece and challenging Clitomachus at Olympia, the crowd, it seems, at once took the part of the former and cheered him on, delighted to see that some one, once in a way at least, ventured to pit himself against Clitomachus. And when, as the fight continued, he appeared to be his adversary's match, and once or twice landed a telling blow, there was great clapping of hands, and the crowd became delirious with excitement, cheering on Aristonicus. At this time they say that Clitomachus, after withdrawing for a few moments to recover his breath, turned to the crowd and asked them what they meant by cheering on Aristonicus and backing him up all they could. Did they think he himself was not fighting fairly, or were they not aware that Clitomachus was now fighting for the glory of Greece and Aristonicus for that of King Ptolemy? Would they prefer to see an Egyptian conquer the Greeks and win the Olympian crown, or to hear a Theban and Boeotian proclaimed by the herald as victor in the men's boxing-match? When Clitomachus had spoken thus, they say there was such a change in the sentiment of the crowd that now all was reversed, and Aristonicus was beaten rather by the crowd than by Clitomachus”

Polybius XXVII [4] (tr. Paton, L.C.L.)

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