Olympic Games - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Visualization of the Olympic Games. The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (French: Jeux olympiques[2]) are the leading international sporting event featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games are considered to be the world's foremost sports competition with more than 2. The Olympic Games are held every four years, with the Summer and Winter Games alternating by occurring every four years but two years apart. Their creation was inspired by the ancient Olympic Games, which were held in Olympia, Greece, from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. Baron Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1. The IOC is the governing body of the Olympic Movement, with the Olympic Charter defining its structure and authority. The evolution of the Olympic Movement during the 2. Olympic Games. Some of these adjustments include the creation of the Winter Olympic Games for ice and winter sports, the Paralympic Games for athletes with a disability, and the Youth Olympic Games for teenage athletes. The IOC has had to adapt to a variety of economic, political, and technological advancements. As a result, the Olympics has shifted away from pure amateurism, as envisioned by Coubertin, to allowing participation of professional athletes. The growing importance of mass media created the issue of corporate sponsorship and commercialization of the Games. World wars led to the cancellation of the 1. Official website of the Olympic Games Find all past and future Olympics Youth Olympics sports athletes medals results IOC news photos videos. Frequently Asked Questions about the Ancient Olympic Games. Where did the Olympic games come from? Why were they held at Olympia? The Olympic Games. The Olympic Games began over 2,700 years ago in Olympia, in southwest Greece. The Games were part of a religious festival. The Greek Olympics. Games. Large boycotts during the Cold War limited participation in the 1. Games. The Olympic Movement consists of international sports federations (IFs), National Olympic Committees (NOCs), and organizing committees for each specific Olympic Games. As the decision- making body, the IOC is responsible for choosing the host city for each Games, and organizes and funds the Games according to the Olympic Charter. The IOC also determines the Olympic program, consisting of the sports to be contested at the Games. There are several Olympic rituals and symbols, such as the Olympic flag and torch, as well as the opening and closing ceremonies. Over 1. 3,0. 00 athletes compete at the Summer and Winter Olympic Games in 3. The first, second, and third- place finishers in each event receive Olympic medals: gold, silver, and bronze, respectively. The Games have grown so much that nearly every nation is now represented. Olympic.org Official website of the Olympic Movement. The Olympic Games in Antiquity. Legal Information | Jobs | Newsletter | FAQ. The modern Olympic Games or Olympics. Greek interest in reviving the Olympic Games began with the Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1821. The Olympic Games is an international deez nuts multi-sport event subdivided into summer and winter. many Olympic athletes began using drugs to enhance their. This growth has created numerous challenges and controversies, including boycotts, doping, bribery, and a terrorist attack in 1. Every two years the Olympics and its media exposure provide unknown athletes with the chance to attain national and sometimes international fame. The Games also constitute an opportunity for the host city and country to showcase themselves to the world. Ancient Olympics. The Ancient Olympic Games were religious and athletic festivals held every four years at the sanctuary of Zeus in Olympia, Greece. Competition was among representatives of several city- states and kingdoms of Ancient Greece. These Games featured mainly athletic but also combat sports such as wrestling and the pankration, horse and chariot racing events. It has been widely written that during the Games, all conflicts among the participating city- states were postponed until the Games were finished. This cessation of hostilities was known as the Olympic peace or truce.[4] This idea is a modern myth because the Greeks never suspended their wars. The truce did allow those religious pilgrims who were traveling to Olympia to pass through warring territories unmolested because they were protected by Zeus.[5] The origin of the Olympics is shrouded in mystery and legend; one of the most popular myths identifies Heracles and his father Zeus as the progenitors of the Games.[7] According to legend, it was Heracles who first called the Games "Olympic" and established the custom of holding them every four years.[1. The myth continues that after Heracles completed his twelve labors, he built the Olympic Stadium as an honor to Zeus. Following its completion, he walked in a straight line for 2. Greek: ПѓП„О¬ОґО№ОїОЅ, Latin: stadium, "stage"), which later became a unit of distance. The most widely accepted inception date for the Ancient Olympics is 7. BC; this is based on inscriptions, found at Olympia, listing the winners of a footrace held every four years starting in 7. BC.[1. 1] The Ancient Games featured running events, a pentathlon (consisting of a jumping event, discus and javelin throws, a foot race, and wrestling), boxing, wrestling, pankration, and equestrian events.[1. Tradition has it that Coroebus, a cook from the city of Elis, was the first Olympic champion. The Olympics were of fundamental religious importance, featuring sporting events alongside ritual sacrifices honoring both Zeus (whose famous statue by Phidias stood in his temple at Olympia) and Pelops, divine hero and mythical king of Olympia. Pelops was famous for his chariot race with King Oenomaus of Pisatis. The winners of the events were admired and immortalized in poems and statues. The Games were held every four years, and this period, known as an Olympiad, was used by Greeks as one of their units of time measurement. Greek interest in bringing back the Olympic Games began with the Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1821. How did the Olympic start? The Olympic Games began over 2,700 years ago in Olympia, in south west Greece. Every four years. Olympic Games, athletic festival. Notions that the Olympics began much earlier. Each country that desires to participate in the Olympic Games must have a. The first games began as an annual foot race of young women in competition for the position of the. Ancient Olympic Games; Pythian Games; Nemean Games; Heraean Games. The Games were part of a cycle known as the Panhellenic Games, which included the Pythian Games, the Nemean Games, and the Isthmian Games.[1. The Olympic Games reached their zenith in the 6th and 5th centuries BC, but then gradually declined in importance as the Romans gained power and influence in Greece. While there is no scholarly consensus as to when the Games officially ended, the most commonly held date is 3. AD, when the emperor Theodosius I decreed that all pagan cults and practices be eliminated.[1. Another date commonly cited is 4. AD, when his successor, Theodosius II, ordered the destruction of all Greek temples. Modern Games. Forerunners. Various uses of the term "Olympic" to describe athletic events in the modern era have been documented since the 1. The first such event was the Cotswold Games or "Cotswold Olimpick Games", an annual meeting near Chipping Campden, England, involving various sports. It was first organized by the lawyer Robert Dover between 1. The British Olympic Association, in its bid for the 2. Olympic Games in London, mentioned these games as "the first stirrings of Britain's Olympic beginnings".[2. L'Olympiade de la RГ©publique, a national Olympic festival held annually from 1. Revolutionary France also attempted to emulate the ancient Olympic Games.[2. The competition included several disciplines from the ancient Greek Olympics. The 1. 79. 6 Games also marked the introduction of the metric system into sport.[2. In 1. 85. 0 an Olympian Class was started by Dr. William Penny Brookes at Much Wenlock, in Shropshire, England. In 1. 85. 9, Dr. Brookes changed the name to the Wenlock Olympian Games. This annual sports festival continues to this day. The Wenlock Olympian Society was founded by Dr. Brookes on 1. 5 November 1. Between 1. 86. 2 and 1. Liverpool held an annual Grand Olympic Festival. Devised by John Hulley and Charles Melly, these games were the first to be wholly amateur in nature and international in outlook, although only 'gentlemen amateurs' could compete. The programme of the first modern Olympiad in Athens in 1. Liverpool Olympics.[2. In 1. 86. 5 Hulley, Dr. Brookes and E. G. Ravenstein founded the National Olympian Association in Liverpool, a forerunner of the British Olympic Association. Its articles of foundation provided the framework for the International Olympic Charter. In 1. 86. 6, a national Olympic Games in Great Britain was organized at London's Crystal Palace.[2. Revival. A postage stamp from the first Greek Olympic stamp set. Greek interest in reviving the Olympic Games began with the Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1. It was first proposed by poet and newspaper editor Panagiotis Soutsos in his poem "Dialogue of the Dead", published in 1. Evangelos Zappas, a wealthy Greek- Romanian philanthropist, first wrote to King Otto of Greece, in 1. Olympic Games. Zappas sponsored the first Olympic Games in 1. Athens city square. Athletes participated from Greece and the Ottoman Empire. Zappas funded the restoration of the ancient Panathenaic Stadium so that it could host all future Olympic Games. The stadium hosted Olympics in 1. Thirty thousand spectators attended that Games in 1. Games. In 1. 89. 0, after attending the Olympian Games of the Wenlock Olympian Society, Baron Pierre de Coubertin was inspired to found the International Olympic Committee (IOC).[3. Coubertin built on the ideas and work of Brookes and Zappas with the aim of establishing internationally rotating Olympic Games that would occur every four years.[3. He presented these ideas during the first Olympic Congress of the newly created International Olympic Committee. This meeting was held from 1. June 1. 89. 4, at the University of Paris. On the last day of the Congress, it was decided that the first Olympic Games to come under the auspices of the IOC would take place in Athens in 1. The IOC elected the Greek writer Demetrius Vikelas as its first president. Games. The first Games held under the auspices of the IOC was hosted in the Panathenaic stadium in Athens in 1. The Games brought together 1. Zappas and his cousin Konstantinos Zappas had left the Greek government a trust to fund future Olympic Games. This trust was used to help finance the 1. Games.[3. 8][3. 9]George Averoff contributed generously for the refurbishment of the stadium in preparation for the Games. The Greek government also provided funding, which was expected to be recouped through the sale of tickets and from the sale of the first Olympic commemorative stamp set. Greek officials and the public were enthusiastic about the experience of hosting an Olympic Games. This feeling was shared by many of the athletes, who even demanded that Athens be the permanent Olympic host city. Ancient Olympic Games - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The Olympic Games (Greek: ОџО»П…ОјПЂО№О±ОєОїОЇ О±ОіПЋОЅОµП‚ , "Olympiakoi Agones") were a series of athletic competitions among representatives of city- states and one of the Panhellenic Games of Ancient Greece. They were held in honor of Zeus, and the Greeks gave them a mythologicalorigin. The first Olympics is traditionally dated to 7. BC. They continued to be celebrated when Greece came under Roman rule, until the emperor Theodosius I suppressed them in 3. AD as part of the campaign to impose Christianity as the state religion of Rome. The games were held every four years, or olympiad, which became a unit of time in historical chronologies. During the celebration of the games, an Olympic Truce was enacted so that athletes could travel from their countries to the games in safety. The prizes for the victors were olive leaf wreaths or crowns. The games became a political tool used by city- states to assert dominance over their rivals. Politicians would announce political alliances at the games, and in times of war, priests would offer sacrifices to the gods for victory. The games were also used to help spread Hellenistic culture throughout the Mediterranean. The Olympics also featured religious celebrations and artistic competitions. The statue of Zeus at Olympia was counted as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Sculptors and poets would congregate each olympiad to display their works of art to would- be patrons. The ancient Olympics had fewer events than the modern games, and only freeborn Greek men were allowed to participate,[2] although a woman, Bilistiche, is also mentioned as a winning chariot owner. As long as they met the entrance criteria, athletes from any city- state and Macedon were allowed to participate, although the Hellanodikai, the officials in charge, allowed king Alexander I to participate in the games only after he had proven his Greek ancestry.[3][4] The games were always held at Olympia rather than alternating to different locations as is the tradition with the modern Olympic Games.[5] Victors at the Olympics were honored, and their feats chronicled for future generations. Origins. An artist's impression of ancient Olympia. To the Greeks, it was important to root the Olympic Games in mythology.[6] During the time of the ancient games their origins were attributed to the gods, and competing legends persisted as to who actually was responsible for the genesis of the games.[7] These origin of traditions have become nearly impossible to untangle, yet a chronology and patterns have arisen that help people understand the story behind the games.[8]The earliest myths regarding the origin of the games are recounted by the Greek historian, Pausanias. According to the story, the dactyl Herakles (not to be confused with the son of Zeus) and four of his brothers, Paeonaeus, Epimedes, Iasius and Idas, raced at Olympia to entertain the newborn Zeus. He crowned the victor with an olive tree wreath, (which thus became a peace symbol) which also explains the four year interval, bringing the games around every fifth year (counting inclusively).[9][1. The other Olympian gods (so named because they lived permanently on Mount Olympus), would also engage in wrestling, jumping and running contests.[1. Another myth of the origin of the games is the story of Pelops, a local Olympian hero. The story of Pelops begins with Oenomaus, the king of Pisa, Greece, who had a beautiful daughter named Hippodamia. According to an oracle, the king would be killed by her husband. Therefore, he decreed that any young man who wanted to marry his daughter was required to drive away with her in his chariot, and Oenomaus would follow in another chariot and spear the suitor if he caught up with them. Now, the king's chariot horses were a present from the god Poseidon and were therefore supernaturally fast. Pelops was a very handsome young man and the king's daughter fell in love with him. Before the race, she persuaded her father's charioteer Myrtilus to replace the bronze axle pins of the king's chariot with wax ones. Naturally, during the race the wax melted and the king fell from his chariot and was killed. At the same time the king's palace was struck by lightning and reduced to ashes, save for one wooden pillar that was revered in the Altis for centuries, and stood near what was to be the site of the temple of Zeus. Pelops was proclaimed the winner and married Hippodamia. After his victory, Pelops organized chariot races as thanksgiving to the gods and as funeral games in honor of King Oenomaus, in order to be purified of his death. It was from this funeral race held at Olympia that the beginnings of the Olympic Games were inspired. Pelops became a great king, a local hero, and gave his name to the Peloponnese. Another myth, this one occurring after the aforementioned myth, is attributed to Pindar. He claims the festival at Olympia involved Herakles, the son of Zeus. The story goes that after completing his labors, Herakles established an athletic festival to honor his father. The games of previous millennia were discontinued and then revived by Lycurgus of Sparta, Iphitos of Elis, and Cleoisthenes of Pisa at the behest of the Oracle of Delphi who claimed that the people had strayed from the gods, which had caused a plague and constant war. Restoration of the games would end the plague, usher in a time of peace, and signal a return to a more traditional lifestyle.[1. The patterns that emerge from these myths are that the Greeks believed the games had their roots in religion, that athletic competition was tied to worship of the gods, and the revival of the ancient games was intended to bring peace, harmony and a return to the origins of Greek life.[1. Since these myths were documented by historians like Pausanias, who lived during the reign of Marcus Aurelius in the 1. AD, it is likely that these stories are more fable than fact. The games were abolished in 3. CE by Emperor Theodosius.[1. The origins of many aspects of the Olympics date to funeral games of the Mycenean period and later.[1. Early examples are known such as those held for Patroclus by Achilles, described by Homer and in Book 5 of Virgil's Aeneid, in which Aeneas organizes athletic contests on the anniversary of his father's death. History. The games were held to be one of the two central rituals in Ancient Greece, the other being the much older religious festival, the Eleusinian Mysteries.[1. The games started in Olympia, Greece, in a sanctuary site for the Greek deities near the towns of Elis and Pisa (both in Elis on the peninsula of Peloponnesos). The first games began as an annual foot race of young women in competition for the position of the priestess for the goddess, Hera[1. The Heraea Games, the first recorded competition for women in the Olympic Stadium, were held as early as the sixth century BC. It originally consisted of foot races only, as did the competition for males. Some texts, including Pausanias's Description of Greece, c. AD 1. 75, state that Hippodameia gathered a group known as the "Sixteen Women" and made them administrators of the Heraea Games, out of gratitude for her marriage to Pelops. Other texts related to the Elis and Pisa conflict indicate that the "Sixteen Women" were peacemakers from Pisa and Elis and, because of their political competence, became administrators of the Heraea. Being the consort of Hera in Classical Greekmythology, Zeus was the father of the deities in the pantheon of that era. The Sanctuary of Zeus in Olympia housed a 1. Zeus that had been sculpted by Phidias circa 4. BC. This statue was one of the ancient Seven Wonders of the World. By the time of the Classical Greek culture, in the fifth and fourth centuries BC, the games were restricted to male participants. The historian Ephorus, who lived in the fourth century BC, is one potential candidate for establishing the use of Olympiads to count years, although credit for codifying this particular epoch usually falls to Hippias of Elis, to Eratosthenes, or even to Timaeus, whom Eratosthenes may have imitated.[1. The Olympic Games were held at four- year intervals, and later, the ancient historians' method of counting the years even referred to these games, using the term Olympiad for the period between two games. Previously, the local dating systems of the Greek states were used (they continued to be used by everyone except the historians), which led to confusion when trying to determine dates. For example, Diodorus states that there was a solar eclipse in the third year of the 1. Olympiad, which must be the eclipse of 3. BC. This gives a date of (mid- summer) 7. BC for the first year of the first Olympiad.[2. Nevertheless, there is disagreement among scholars as to when the games began.[2. The "Exedra" reserved for the judges at Olympia on the north embankment of the stadium. The only competition held then was, according to the later Greek traveller Pausanias who wrote in 1. AD., the stadion race, a race over about 1. Hercules. The word stadium is derived from this foot race. The Greek tradition of athletic nudity (gymnos)[2. BC, either by the Spartans or by the Megarian Orsippus, and this was adopted early in the Olympics as well. Several groups fought over control of the sanctuary at Olympia, and hence the games, for prestige and political advantage. Pausanias later writes that in 6. BC, Pheidon of Argos was commissioned by the town of Pisa to capture the sanctuary from the town of Elis, which he did and then personally controlled the games for that year. The next year, Elis regained control. The Olympic Games were part of the Panhellenic Games, four separate games held at two- or four- year intervals, but arranged so that there was at least one set of games every year. The Olympic Games were more important and more prestigious than the Pythian, Nemean, and Isthmian Games. The games were in decline for many years but continued past 3.
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