Consolation prize
A consolation prize is a symbolic prize that is not given to the winner but to the loser of a game or competition .
Its award is intended to comfort the loser and encourage him to take part again in the next competition. Sometimes all participants receive consolation prizes.
Examples
- The Roman poet Virgil writes in his epic Aeneid in Canto 5: "He immediately had the two battle prizes displayed, a bull adorned with gold-plated horns and bands, for the winner, for the conquered a sword and a magnificent helmet as a consolation prize."
- In the Middle Ages, the loser often received a pig as a consolation prize at a shooting festival or a race. This is probably where the German idiom has come from .
Individual evidence
- ↑ http://www.zeno.org/Literatur/M/Vergil/Epos/Aeneis/F%C3%BCnfter+Gesang?hl=trostpreis
- ^ Friedrich Kluge / Elmar Seebold: Etymological Dictionary of the German Language , Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2002, p. 833, ISBN 3110174731