When the 2020, Tokyo, olympic medals (in fact, the reverse face) were recently revealed, I did like a lot the design as well as the rich copper colour of what is called the "bronze" medal. Mind you, the bronze medal is 95 % copper but somehow "copper" sounds less noble than "bronze" and so the latter was adopted resulting often in medals of an awful colour (but this is not the case for the olympic ones). And, it is interesting to point out that the greek word for the metal of the third-place medal is χαλκός i.e. copper.
There were no medals in the ancient Olympics. And, of course, only the winner of the event was celebrated. This is in line with the greek tradition which considers that what matters is to be πρώτος (first). What bestows honour to the athlete is to be victorious. All other positions mean that one has been defeated. In the ancient times the idea was all or nothing and thus there were no classifications: the only thing that counted was first place.
The winner's at the Olympic Games reward was the κότινος (kotinos), a wreath made from a branch of a sacred olive tree in Olympia. While the olive wreath is somehow the emblem of the (ancient) Olympic Games, that has not always been so. In fact for the first five Olympiads the prize of the winner was ... an apple. It was the Oracle of Delphi who mandated the use of the olive wreath, in memory of Heracles who, as the myth goes, created the Games when he organised, in Olympia, a running competition and crowned the winner with an olive wreath. During the prize ceremony, which took place in the sanctuary of Zeus, the winners entered the temple carrying a branch of a palm tree. The latter was in memory of Theseus who first organised an athletic competition in the sacred island of Delos, where the winners were crowned with a wreath from a palm tree.
While the games at Olympia are the most famous ones, there existed in Ancient Greece several athletic competitions, held in the different cities and with various periodicities.
The Pythian were held in Delphi. The winner was crowned with a laurel wreath. However there is also mention of a palm tree branch, which makes sense. Delphi was the sanctuary of Apollo, who was born in the island of Delos, where the palm tree branch was used in order to crown the winners.
In the Isthmian, which were held in Corinth, the winners were receiving a wreath from a pine tree. And, quite expectedly, the palm tree is also mentioned.
The Nemean games were special in the sense that the winner's wreath was made from wild parsley.
This last may sound a little bit bizarre, but by now you have certainly understood that the use of this or that plant in the ancient games was dictated by the local traditions, plants playing a very important role in the life of ancient Greeks. And since we are talking about plants I cannot resist the temptation to point out that the word "marathon" means "fennel field" and it should be decomposed as marath- and -on. Thus I find it ridiculous when people think that the ending is -thon and go on to compose any number of frankestein-y compositions.
The list of major Ancient Games cannot be complete until one mentions the Heraean Games. I wrote about these games in my post on Women athletics in ancient Greece. Since the publication of that post I have consulted various sources and, while all of them agree that the Heraean were established by the (semi-mythical) Hippodameia, some historians claim that the first competition among women predates the one among men. I find the idea quite attractive. Be that as it may, since the Games were held in Olympia, the winners were crowned with an olive wreath, just like their male counterparts.
Olive played also a major role in the Panathinaia, since Athena was the patron deity of Athens and the olive tree is the sacred tree of the goddess. However in this case the prize was not an olive wreath by several Panathenaic amphorae full of oil.
Speaking of which, it's high time we dispelled the amateurism myth. The ancient greek athletes were not amateur. (Unfortunately there exist totally erroneous arguments in support of this, based on wrong etymological analyses. Αθλος in greek means feat, exploit, a major achievement. So αθλητής is someone who tries to realise such a feat. The word for prize is έπαθλον which means a reward for the achievement. Mixing everything, in particular considering that άθλος is the prize and so αθλητής is somebody who competes for a prize, and using this argument as a proof of non-amateurism, is, to say the least, grossly unscientific).
Going back to Homer we read that there were material prizes for the winners of the events of the Patroklos funeral games organised by Achilles himself on the plain of Troy. All major ancient greek games winners were obtaining material prizes. For instance, a citizen of Athens who won at the Olympics would receive a pension allowing him to live comfortably the rest of his life. Does this mean that the ancient greek athletes were professional? There is no simple answer to this: the distinction between amateur and professional has a meaning only when both classes do exist. In Ancient Greece athletes were athletes.
So if the ancient athletes were not amateur how did this amateurism rigmarole come to be? It all goes back to the creation of the modern sports movement, spurred by W. Brookes Wenlock Olympian Games and J. Hulley's Liverpool Olympic Festival. Brookesʼ credo that “athletes should not be paid for their efforts” became the standard of modern sports and was embraced wholeheartedly by P. de Coubertin. But, upon a closer look, this principle did not aim at preserving nobility of “playing for the love of the game” but at maintaining the segregation between nobility and the plebeians. The amateurism rules were so strict that one could be tainted with professionalism if one had competed against professional athletes, even if one had not received any monetary prize. In fact competitors could be barred from amateur competitions if they were or had been employed as “a mechanic, artisan or labourer”.
And of course, the justification of all this was purportedly to be found in Ancient Greece. A. Brundage, to whom I have devoted a long debunking post, once wrote, “The amateur code, coming to us from antiquity (emphasis mine), contributed to and strengthened by the noblest aspirations of great men of each generation, embraces the highest moral laws. No philosophy, no religion, preaches loftier sentiments”. And adding insult to injury, "Sport must be amateur or it is not sport. Sports played professionally are entertainment". How could anybody in their right mind make such a ridiculous statement?
The word "amateur" comes from the latin and it, essentially, means "lover". The greek equivalent is "ερασιτέχνης" which means "lover of art". Does the restrictive use of this term for non-professionals imply that professionals do not love what they are doing? I am convinced of the opposite.
This post was inspired by the olympic medals but, as I started to talk about Ancient Greece and the prizes of the winners, I was carried away with my rant on amateurism. So the medals have to wait for the next post.
The reverse face of the Tokyo 2020 medals
An olive wreath like the ones used in the 2004 Olympics
The winner's at the Olympic Games reward was the κότινος (kotinos), a wreath made from a branch of a sacred olive tree in Olympia. While the olive wreath is somehow the emblem of the (ancient) Olympic Games, that has not always been so. In fact for the first five Olympiads the prize of the winner was ... an apple. It was the Oracle of Delphi who mandated the use of the olive wreath, in memory of Heracles who, as the myth goes, created the Games when he organised, in Olympia, a running competition and crowned the winner with an olive wreath. During the prize ceremony, which took place in the sanctuary of Zeus, the winners entered the temple carrying a branch of a palm tree. The latter was in memory of Theseus who first organised an athletic competition in the sacred island of Delos, where the winners were crowned with a wreath from a palm tree.
While the games at Olympia are the most famous ones, there existed in Ancient Greece several athletic competitions, held in the different cities and with various periodicities.
The Pythian were held in Delphi. The winner was crowned with a laurel wreath. However there is also mention of a palm tree branch, which makes sense. Delphi was the sanctuary of Apollo, who was born in the island of Delos, where the palm tree branch was used in order to crown the winners.
In the Isthmian, which were held in Corinth, the winners were receiving a wreath from a pine tree. And, quite expectedly, the palm tree is also mentioned.
The Nemean games were special in the sense that the winner's wreath was made from wild parsley.
This last may sound a little bit bizarre, but by now you have certainly understood that the use of this or that plant in the ancient games was dictated by the local traditions, plants playing a very important role in the life of ancient Greeks. And since we are talking about plants I cannot resist the temptation to point out that the word "marathon" means "fennel field" and it should be decomposed as marath- and -on. Thus I find it ridiculous when people think that the ending is -thon and go on to compose any number of frankestein-y compositions.
The list of major Ancient Games cannot be complete until one mentions the Heraean Games. I wrote about these games in my post on Women athletics in ancient Greece. Since the publication of that post I have consulted various sources and, while all of them agree that the Heraean were established by the (semi-mythical) Hippodameia, some historians claim that the first competition among women predates the one among men. I find the idea quite attractive. Be that as it may, since the Games were held in Olympia, the winners were crowned with an olive wreath, just like their male counterparts.
Olive played also a major role in the Panathinaia, since Athena was the patron deity of Athens and the olive tree is the sacred tree of the goddess. However in this case the prize was not an olive wreath by several Panathenaic amphorae full of oil.
This image of a Panathenaic amphora should ring a bell
Going back to Homer we read that there were material prizes for the winners of the events of the Patroklos funeral games organised by Achilles himself on the plain of Troy. All major ancient greek games winners were obtaining material prizes. For instance, a citizen of Athens who won at the Olympics would receive a pension allowing him to live comfortably the rest of his life. Does this mean that the ancient greek athletes were professional? There is no simple answer to this: the distinction between amateur and professional has a meaning only when both classes do exist. In Ancient Greece athletes were athletes.
So if the ancient athletes were not amateur how did this amateurism rigmarole come to be? It all goes back to the creation of the modern sports movement, spurred by W. Brookes Wenlock Olympian Games and J. Hulley's Liverpool Olympic Festival. Brookesʼ credo that “athletes should not be paid for their efforts” became the standard of modern sports and was embraced wholeheartedly by P. de Coubertin. But, upon a closer look, this principle did not aim at preserving nobility of “playing for the love of the game” but at maintaining the segregation between nobility and the plebeians. The amateurism rules were so strict that one could be tainted with professionalism if one had competed against professional athletes, even if one had not received any monetary prize. In fact competitors could be barred from amateur competitions if they were or had been employed as “a mechanic, artisan or labourer”.
And of course, the justification of all this was purportedly to be found in Ancient Greece. A. Brundage, to whom I have devoted a long debunking post, once wrote, “The amateur code, coming to us from antiquity (emphasis mine), contributed to and strengthened by the noblest aspirations of great men of each generation, embraces the highest moral laws. No philosophy, no religion, preaches loftier sentiments”. And adding insult to injury, "Sport must be amateur or it is not sport. Sports played professionally are entertainment". How could anybody in their right mind make such a ridiculous statement?
The word "amateur" comes from the latin and it, essentially, means "lover". The greek equivalent is "ερασιτέχνης" which means "lover of art". Does the restrictive use of this term for non-professionals imply that professionals do not love what they are doing? I am convinced of the opposite.
This post was inspired by the olympic medals but, as I started to talk about Ancient Greece and the prizes of the winners, I was carried away with my rant on amateurism. So the medals have to wait for the next post.
