Ancient Olympics Essay -- essays research papers fc

History of the Ancient exceeding GamesThe Ancient Hellenic Olympics were not only sporting guinea pigs, it was a celebration to honor the corking and powerful Zeus. The Ancient Olympics were held every four years at the noted Olympia, a district of Elis, here all free Greek manpower were allowed to compete. The first record of the Olympic Games was held in 776 B.C. The main sports were the Pentathlon, the Equestrian Events, Pankration, and Boxing.The Pentathlon was the material body for the five events in Greek gymnastics running, jumping, wrestling, discus seeing, and javelin throwing which began with the 18th Olympiad. In the wrestling event, wrestlers were anointed with oil, dusted with powder, and forbidden to bite or gouge whizz another. wrestling was looked upon as a weapon-free military exercise. Since there was no weapons wrestlers that competed used their tilt and strength as an advantage especially since there were no weight unit categories. The Javelin was th rown in the same form back in past times as it is thrown today. The first recorded Olympic Games had one event, a race, called the stade which is a measure of the distance of the length of the track. By 724 B.C. a two-length race was added and by 700 B.C. there were longer distance races. By 720 B.C., manpower participated naked, except in the foot race in armor that weighed in the midst of fifty to sixty pounds. The outfit included a helmet, greaves, and a harbour that helped young men build speed and stamina in dressing for war. The Pentathlon included three running events such as the Stade, the Diaulos, and the Dolichos. The Stade was a two 100 yard foot race, was the first and only Olympic event for 13 Games. The dolichos was a variable length foot race averaging 20 stades or four thousand yards for the fifteenth Olympiad. The Diaulos was a four hundred yard foot race that was instituted for the next Olympic Games. The discus was considered by ancient Greeks, an event of rhythm, precision, and finesse of a competitor to throw the discus was as important as his strength. The discus was made of stone, iron, bronze, or lead, and was molded same(p) a flying saucer. The Sizes were different for the boys division, since the boys were not expected to throw the same weighted discus as the men. The athletes who competed in the jump event used lead or stone jump weights called halteres shaped like telephone receivers to increase ... ...rces, but in the historic years their demote is said to be Oxylos whose descendant Ifitos later rejuvenated the games. According to tradition, the Olympic Games began in 776 B.C. when Ifitos made a treaty with Lycourgos the king and famous legislator of Sparta and Cleisthenes the king of Pissa (Coote p. 13). The text edition of the treaty was written on a disc and kept in the Heraion. In this treaty that was the decisive event for the development of the sanctuary as a Panhellenic centre, the "sacred truce" was agre ed, that is to say the ceasing of fighting in the entire Greek world for as long as the Olympic Games were on. As a reward for the victors, the cotinus, which was a wreath made from a branch of wild olive tree that was growing next to the opisthodomus of the temple of Zeus in the sacred Altis, was established after an order of the enigmatic oracle. Works CitedCoote, James. A Picture History of the Olympics. London, England Tom Stacey Limited, 1972.Kristy, Davida. Olympics How the Games Began. Minneapolis, Minnesota Lerner Publications Company, 1995.Grolier, the Associated Press. The Olympic Story. Danbury, Connecticut Grolier Enterprises INC., 1979.