Religion and Sport in Ancient Greece
The practice of sports, as well as a series of other practices developed by human beings, had a religious foundation in ancient civilizations. You GamesOlympic, nowadays quite popular due to the rescue that was done by the Baron de Coubertin, in the 1890s, are no exception. The origin of such games occurred in the city of Olympia, one of the city-states of Ancient Greece (or Hellas), around the 8th century BC. Ç.
In ancient Greece, four major religious festivals were celebrated with sports games: the Pythics, dedicated to god Apollo and performed in the sanctuary of Delphi; you isthmics, held in the sanctuary of Corinth and dedicated to god Poseidon; you Nemeus, held in Nemea, in the sanctuary of Zeus and dedicated to him; and, finally, the Olympians, which were held in Olympia and also dedicated to Zeus.
In order to fully understand the relationship between the Olympic Games and Zeus, it is necessary to refer to a part of the myth of Hercules (or heracles).
Worship of Zeus in Olympia and the myth of Hercules
Hercules, according to Greek mythology, is considered the founder of the Olympic Games. Son of Zeus with a mortal, Hercules was challenged by the goddess Ivy to carry out twelve jobs considered unfeasible. The fifth of these jobs consisted of cleaning the king's corrals Augeans, from the city of Elis. According to the myth, the corrals were inhabited by thousands of animals and had not been cleaned for about 30 years.
Hercules, after managing to do the grueling work, decided to celebrate the feat by inaugurating sports games in honor of his father, Zeus. Such games would have been held for the first time in the sanctuary of Zeus in Olympia and, therefore, received the name of "Olympics" or, simply, Olympics. The mythological narrative aside, in fact, in Olympia, sports games were quite intense, with periodicity of four years and for about five centuries.
Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
Whenever the opening was made, animals were sacrificed in honor of Zeus, as well as other rites, with the lighting of the Olympic flame (which survives to this day).
Sports from the old Olympics
Many of the sports modalities of ancient Greece were very similar to the current ones. Others, in turn, were radically different.
Among those that resembled those practiced today, there were, for example, the racing on foot (called dromes), which were divided into categories, each varying according to the distance and time covered. The current baton relay race derives, for example, from the race in which a lit torch was alternated. There was still the pentathlon (pentathlon) - which is also practiced today, but with modifications -, launch in discs and darts and modalities of fight.
Among the sports that differ from current ones, there was the race in combat armor, called the hoplitodromy; the races with animal-drawn combat cars, such as the chariots (pulled by two horses) and the chariots (pulled by four horses); and, finally, fights like the pankracius, which consisted of something close to “anything goes”. In this modality of fighting without rules, competitors were close to death and punches, headbutts, elbows, twists, chokes, etc. were allowed.
By Me. Cláudio Fernandes
