Sports in ancient Greece

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The article Sports in Ancient Greece deals with the history of sports in Ancient Greece (1600 BC to about 600 AD). The term sport is used in this article in the sense of modern parlance, although this terminology was not used in the past.

Cretan-Mycenaean Age (1600 to 1200 BC)

Mycenae (Greece)
Mycenae
Mycenae
Location of Mycenae in Greece

Only when sport expresses itself as a social phenomenon can it become an object of historical studies . Sport as a social phenomenon first appeared in Europe around 1600 BC. BC, when a high culture developed in the eastern Mediterranean , the center of which was the city of Mycenae in what is now Greece . Despite the meager sources of information, which are limited to archaeological finds, it is possible to get a relatively precise impression of the social conditions and sport of that time. If it was previously assumed that the Greeks of Mycenaean times were the first people to hold sporting competitions , archaeological finds prove that the sporting tradition of the ancient Egyptians dates back to the 3rd millennium BC. Goes back.

Sport in the Mycenaean culture was reserved exclusively for the aristocratic class of society. The pronounced competitive behavior prevailing within the Mycenaean nobility manifested itself, among other things, in various sporting competitions. These competitions took place mainly on festive events such as funerals or weddings. However, there is evidence that some competitions were simply a pastime. The participants in these competitions were primarily concerned with the fame and honor that a successfully completed competition brought with it. Regardless of the various competitions, physical performance and physical superiority enjoyed a very high priority due to the numerous military conflicts, because one of the prerequisites for military success was skillful handling of the various weapons. Accordingly, sport was closely linked to military needs, which led to women being excluded from it.

Athletes in a fist fight (1500 BC)

Traditional types of competition from this time are various races and chariot races , archery , fist and wrestling matches as well as combat with weapons. There are also numerous representations of acrobatic acts on bulls. Due to the increasing influence of Crete on the Mycenaean culture , from the 16th century BC Also the dance of importance, which was the most important phenomenon of the Cretan body culture.

Based on archaeological finds in Olympia , it is assumed that sporting competitions were already held there at this time. The origins of the ancient Olympic Games therefore go back to the Mycenaean period. As Olympia was a place of worship , athletic competitions were held there as ritual acts to honor various gods or heroes . At that time these competitions were only a marginal phenomenon in the cult events of Olympia, but the high value of physical performance becomes clear through this connection between sport and cult .

Archaic Age (800 to 500 BC)

Very few sources and archaeological finds can be found for the four centuries between the decline of the Mycenaean and the beginning of the Archaic epoch . According to Bohus (1986), these so-called dark centuries go hand in hand with a general cultural decline in early Greek culture at that time. Only from the 8th century BC The source situation improves significantly. Above all, the Homeric epics Iliad and Odyssey are of fundamental importance for the further development and standardization of ancient Greek society and form the most important literary sources for the archaic period and its sports history.

Illustration of the Temple of Zeus in Olympia

Archaic society developed as a result of the immigration of Dorians and northwestern Greeks into what is now Greece. With the end of these weighty population shifts around 800 BC. It can be observed that, thanks to a common language , writing and religion, a common cultural unit was formed in the region, which despite political splits was shaped by a common noble system of rule. As in Mycenaean times, sport was tied to the nobility, mostly reserved for men, and enjoyed a high status. In addition, for the first time there was a special name for the competitors, who were called athletaí (from Greek athleuein = "to fight for a price"). Even in the archaic age, competitions were mainly held at festivals, but at this time the cultic festivals and their competitions became immensely important, as did the sporting competitions within these religious cultic festivals. During this time, the most important sacred competitions of the Greeks came about with the Panhellenic Games : the Olympics in Olympia, the Pythias in Delphi , the Isthmias near Corinth and the Nemeen near Nemea . Each of these events served to honor a specific god. While the Olympics and Nemeen were dedicated to Zeus , the Pythias honored Apollon and the Isthmias Poseidon . Due to the religious character of the games, the athletes were worshiped as gods in the event of victory, as victory was understood as a divine gift. In the further course, the Olympics in particular experienced a rise and became the largest and most important games. During the Olympic Games, a so-called Peace of God was proclaimed between warring cities , which guaranteed a truce for the duration of the Games. The earliest verifiable stadium was discovered during excavations in Olympia, where around 700 BC. The Olympic site was expanded to include a multi-lane track.

The first written records of sporting competitions come from Hippias von Elis from the 5th century BC. Chr. Hippias speaks of the organization of the first official Olympic Games in the year 776 BC. His records are to be treated with caution, however, as the accuracy of this information was already doubted in ancient times. Hippias wrote his chronicle of the Olympia games on behalf of the Eleans (residents of the city of Elis and the organizers of the games at the time). His writing was intended to prove the Eleans' claim to the management and organization of the Games, as they had organized them since the beginning of the Olympics . As a result, his records of the first games in particular were often referred to as fakes.

According to the writings of Hippias, from 776 B.C. Olympics held every four years. During the first fourteen Olympic Games, the stadium run was the only discipline to be held. In the further course of the archaic age, disciplines such as double run (double stadium run), cross-country skiing (dolichos), pentathlon ( long jump , stadium run, wrestling, discus and javelin throw ), wrestling , fistfighting , chariot racing , horse riding , pankration (all-round combat ), Gun run and various competitions for young people in the program of the games. The range of different sports was already very large at that time. In addition to the competitions for men, Olympia has been practicing since the 6th century BC. Every four years on the occasion of the Heraia there are also running competitions for women.

Athletes at the gun barrel on a attisch - schwarzfigurigen Amphora the group E (around 550 BC..).

Already around 700 to 600 BC Because of the increased importance of the cultic festivals, groups of athletes formed who devoted their lives exclusively to competitions and their preparation and did not take part in everyday life in their hometowns. The first names of victorious athletes who are said to have performed special performances during the competitions also appear from this time. Some of them are the runners Chionis of Sparta and Cylon of Athens or the Pankratiast Phrynon of Athens .

At the end of the archaic epoch, social conditions began to change. New economic conditions changed the ruling structure and a financially strong middle class raised claims to leadership. Philosophy gained in importance and the value of physical performance diminished.

Classical Age (500 to 300 BC)

With the beginning of the Classical Age , the rulership in ancient Greece continued to change. Democratization advanced, the political and economic balance of power shifted increasingly. With the establishment of a democratic state in Athens around 507 BC Every citizen of Athens could actively intervene in political events. For many other Greek city-states, this Athenian democracy was considered a model. Due to the repulsed attacks of the Persian Empire and the victories against the Carthaginians at the beginning of the 5th century BC. In addition, the Greeks increasingly gained self-confidence. New, imposing buildings were erected in many cities and disciplines such as poetry , visual arts and philosophy enjoyed an unprecedented appreciation. Bengtson (1983) speaks of the beginning of a heyday .

The gods were thanked for their help with military successes with valuable votive gifts. The holy games increased accordingly in importance and scope - especially the games in Olympia, where the largest temple in the Peloponnese now stood. No longer just athletes and spectators flocked to the Olympics during the Games, but also artists and scholars who hoped to gain prominence throughout the Greek world. Victorious athletes, in turn, could be sure of fame and honor across the country. It is assumed that the athletes were no later than the 5th century BC. Completed the competitions completely naked. The exception here were the charioteers who wore loincloths . In earlier centuries it was still the case that athletes wore at least a belt around the pubic area to cover it up. Nudity was explained with the fundamental openness of the ancient Greeks to questions of physicality, but there are also reports of advantages in terms of agility and speed of the athletes that nakedness brought with it. Numerous sculptures and portraits document this nudity.

Honoring the victorious athletes

At first glance, the official prizes for the athletes at the four holy games were more of a symbolic value. In addition to a wreath of branches from the sacred trees of the respective sanctuaries , the winners were allowed to take part in a common feast with the dignitaries of the sanctuary. Back in the hometown, however, the fame that one had gained for the homeland by winning such a competition often brought material advantages such as prize money, tax exemption or free meals. If an athlete from Athens came back victorious from the holy games, he could even enjoy a bonus of 500 drachmas , which at that time corresponded to more than an annual wage. At other competitions, the awards were given directly by the organizers in order to attract the best athletes to their cult festivals. At the games in Athens, the winners received oil in specially made price amphorae . Other prizes were, for example, grain (in Eleusis ), bronze round shields (in Argos ), silver dishes (in Marathon ), metal vessels (in Thebes and at the games in the Arcadian Lykaion Mountains ) or vestments (in Pellene ). These valuable prizes and the admiration of the athletes meant that the athletes drove from one competition to the next with a train of coaches , relatives and activists in the same sequence . The process for the athletes at that time should therefore have been roughly comparable to that of a modern professional athlete. For the first time, middle-class athletes were also allowed to take part in the various competitions.

However, the athletes and the organization of the competitions were also sharply criticized by some philosophers and scholars. They claimed the athletes were shirking the common civic duty to support the common good and forgetting ethical norms because of the lure of victory and its effects.

The 4th century BC BC initiated the decline of the Greek city-state system . The various city-states, above all Athens and Sparta , became more and more entangled in various wars and power struggles until the Macedonians intervened in 338 BC. Chr. Put an end.

Hellenistic Age (336-30 BC)

The Hellenistic Age begins in 336 BC. With the accession of Alexander the great and the beginning of the Greek-Macedonian war of conquest against the Persian Empire. Previously, the Greek city-states had lost their political autonomy as a result of numerous conflicts and were united under Macedonian hegemony in the Corinthian League . Under the leadership of Alexander the Great succeeded until 325 BC. The conquest of the entire Persian Empire, which then reached as far as the Indus , including Egypt. As a result, the Greek culture found an unprecedented distribution.

Gymnasion of Pompeii

The educational structure of the Greeks was very well received. Already in the classical a three-stage education system was composed of elementary school , gymnasium and Academy introduced, in which sport and gymnastics took no significant role. The Gymnasion, the higher school, which was originally a place for sports activities only, was transformed into a center for Hellenic culture. In addition to the intellectual education of young people in leading subjects such as grammar or rhetoric , their athletic training also took place there. At the same time, the grounds of the gymnasium served as a training facility for the athletes who had dedicated their entire lives to athletic competitions. The boys, who showed a special talent in sport, were specifically encouraged after consultation with their parents and included in the athletes' training process so that they could gradually take part in regional and then national competitions. The training was intense and made very hard physical demands on the athletes. While the educational system in the classical period was reserved exclusively for boys, in the Hellenistic era girls were also able to attend educational institutions for the first time and accordingly also enjoy gymnastic activities. Sport was not only practiced as training for competitions, but in the form of gymnastics primarily to improve the health and individual well-being of each individual. This went hand in hand with dietetics , the teaching of a health-conscious way of life, which was increasingly popular with wealthy people. In principle, access to the educational institutions was reserved for the higher social classes, as the lessons were carried out exclusively by private teachers.

The sacred games also saw some changes during this period. Due to the enlargement of the Greek catchment area, foreign athletes were also admitted to the games for the first time. With the increasing importance of the intellectual disciplines, the group of professional athletes was criticized more sharply than ever before.

With the encroachment of the Roman Empire on the Eastern Mediterranean , the Hellenistic states gradually became provinces of the Romans. The incorporation of Egypt into the Roman Empire in the year 30 BC. Chr. Ended this integration process. From this point on, the entire Mediterranean region was in Roman hands.

Hellenistic-Roman Age (200 BC to 600 AD)

With the incorporation of Greece into the Roman Empire, Roman and Hellenistic cultures increasingly mixed . In general, the Hellenistic culture dominated Roman society, but especially in sport, this mixture also led to conflicts. For example, Greek sport and the way in which sporting competitions were organized met with rejection in Rome , since sporting competitions were held there for display purposes only. Most of the sporting competitions such as those carried out by the Greeks were simply too monotonous for the Romans. Only chariot and horse races as well as similarly spectacular events such as gladiator fights or animal hunts were very popular in Rome. Some of these events took place in front of hundreds of thousands of spectators. The largest stadium at that time was the Circus Maximus of Rome, which could seat up to 200,000 people.

Circus Maximus floor plan

The Hellenistic gymnastics, however, in contrast to the sporting competitions in the Roman Empire, met with great approval. Thus, high schools for physical exercises were established in all of the larger towns. Other dietetic influences were also noticeable. So in the last century BC Among other things, the first large baths ( thermal baths ) were built and the number of public baths grew steadily. Gymnastics found no place in the Roman school system alone. Since the sporting performance of the athletes in Rome was not the focus, but the entertainment of the audience, the Greek professional athletes were not very popular and they had been heavily criticized in Greece for some time. With the increasing importance of the public games, military physical education, which was so essential in early Roman times, lost more and more of its importance.

From the 3rd century AD, Christianity increasingly determined the Hellenic-Roman world. In principle, Christianity had nothing against sport or exercise, and yet an anti-body attitude gradually developed. The sacred games of the Greeks, which amounted to idol worship, were rejected, as were the public games of the Romans, which involved cruelty to animals and the murder of people. Emperor Theodosius therefore enforced the ban on the Olympic Games in 394. Athleticism and all public games were banned from then on. The former athletes had to wait a long time before being admitted to baptism , for example . Hellenistic gymnastics and health-oriented sport were also sharply criticized by church teachers who called for a general change in the understanding of the body.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Julius Bohus: Sports history - society and sports from Mycenae to today. BLV Verlagsgesellschaft, Munich / Vienna / Zurich 1986.
  2. ↑ Martin Stadler: Sport in ancient Egypt. In: Ulrich Sinn (Ed.): Sport in antiquity - competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, p. 138.
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Ulrich Sinn: Cult, sport and festivals in antiquity. (= Beck series 2039). Beck, Munich 1996.
  4. ^ Maria Xagorari – Gleißner: Sport in early Greece. In: Ulrich Sinn (Ed.): Sport in antiquity - competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, pp. 142-143.
  5. ^ Hermann Bengtson: The Olympic Games of the ancient world. In: Klaus Bartels (Ed.): Lebendige Antike. Artemis Verlag, Zurich / Munich 1983, p. 13.
  6. ^ Hermann Bengtson: The Olympic Games of the ancient world. In: Klaus Bartels (Ed.): Lebendige Antike. Artemis Verlag, Zurich / Munich 1983, p. 35.
  7. ^ Hermann Bengtson: The Olympic Games of the ancient world. In: Klaus Bartels (Ed.): Lebendige Antike. Artemis Verlag, Zurich / Munich 1983, pp. 57–59.
  8. ^ Julius Bohus: Sports history - society and sports from Mycenae to today. BLV Verlagsgesellschaft, Munich / Vienna / Zurich 1986, pp. 25–32.
  9. ^ Hermann Bengtson: The Olympic Games of the ancient world. In: Klaus Bartels (Ed.): Lebendige Antike. Artemis Verlag, Zurich / Munich 1983, p. 69.
  10. ↑ Paraskevi Grigorotsioli: The Nudity of Athletes. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. P. 48.
  11. ↑ Dimitra Potsi, Meta Rodenkirchen, Ulrich Sinn: Award of the winner. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, pp. 52-53.
  12. ↑ Ulrich Sinn: Competitions outside of Olympia. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, p. 74.
  13. ↑ Ulrich Sinn: The godlike worship of athletes. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, p. 84.
  14. ↑ Ulrich Sinn: The reputation of the athletes. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, p. 83.
  15. ↑ Ulrich Sinn: The athletes in public criticism. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, pp. 95-96.
  16. ^ Julius Bohus: Sports history - society and sports from Mycenae to today. BLV Verlagsgesellschaft, Munich / Vienna / Zurich 1986, pp. 33–40.
  17. ^ Christian Wacker : The Gymnasium educational institution and cultural center. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, pp. 105-106.
  18. ↑ Christina Weber: Education by private teachers. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, p. 116.
  19. ^ Stephan Specht: Training and functionaries in ancient high-performance sport. In: Ulrich Sinn (Hrsg.): Sport in antiquity: competition, play and education in antiquity. Ergon Verlag, Würzburg 1996, p. 124.
  20. ^ Julius Bohus: Sports history - society and sports from Mycenae to today. BLV Verlagsgesellschaft, Munich / Vienna / Zurich 1986, pp. 46–54.