The Ages of Greek History

3000-1200: Minoans/Mycenaeans
c. 1200: Trojan War
1200- 750: Dark Age
776: Olympic Games founded
c. 750: Homer
750-480: Archaic Age
480-323: The Classical Age
323-30: The Hellenistic Age
 AGA, Chapter 4
Crown competititions:
the events at Olympia, Delphi,
Nemea, and Isthmia
Crown (stephanitic)
Competitions

Gymnikos Agon
&
Hippikos Agon
 The Footraces (f. 63)
▪ Stadion (stadium), 30 x
200 yards (1 stade)
▪ Olympia held about 20
Runners
▪ Heats held for more
than 20 runners
▪ 4 types of footraces
 The Stadion (Stade) (f. 34)
▪ highest prestige (40a, sect. 5, 31-43)
▪ 200 yards long
diaulos: ‘double-flute’ (f. 67)
▪ 400 yards (40a, sect. 6)
▪ Two lengths of the stadion
f. 31
f. 30
 Dolichos (f. 67)
▪ 20 or 24 laps?
▪ No staggered starts
f. 65
Hoplitodromos (40a, sect. 7)
▪ 400 yards in armor of some kind
▪ Not very highly regarded
 The hippios: ‘horse’ race
▪ 800 yards, not an Olympic event
 The torch race
▪ Relay race found only at Athens
▪ 40 or so young men (18-20 yrs)
The Marathon (35p, 8g)
Balbis & Trumpet, (f. 37 & 51)
Starting Position (f.39, 42)
 Kampter (f. 65, 66)
▪ Crashes, Cheating (38g, 35o)
 Hysplex A (f. 50)
▪ First found in early 5th C.
Hysplex B
(F. 55, 54)
F. 57
Hysplex C (3rd C), F. 62, 60
 Body-Contact Sports
▪ Wrestling, Boxing, Pankration
▪ No weight classes, no rounds
▪ Different age categories
▪ youth, adult (and beardless)
▪ Not all events were held for youth and
beardless categories
▪ Order in which events were added at
Olympia (see p. 23)
▪ Method for pairing competitors (38F)
 Pale (wrestling)
▪ Status of wrestling
▪ (38a, sect. 24-26, 40a sect. 11)
▪ Palaestra
▪ How is winner determined (7d, i1B)
▪ Defeat admitted by raising a finger
f. 207
 Starting
Stance,
(f. 68, 143)
‘Grabbing the
Middle’
f. 70
f. 74
Turning the
rear,
f. 76, 77
snap
mare,
f. 78
Grabbing the legs, f. 71, 72
 the skamma
▪ pit dug in stadium
▪ At Olympia: next to the Temple of Zeus
▪ Palaestra could have 2 pits?
 Pyx (Boxing) (f. 80)
▪ Bloody, painful, deadly (40a,sect. 9-10)
f. 87
 Rules
▪ No wrestling
▪ No low blows
▪ No pigskin thongs
▪ Quitting
f. 90
f. 91
Himas (Himantes) (f. 81)
 Training Equipment, f. 84
▪ Ear-guards (35n)
▪ Spheres
▪ heavy bag (40a, sect. 57)
 Oxys,
f. 85
▪ Late 4th C. BC
Techniques, f. 83
Blows to the body (f. 94, 95)
(37z)
Myth of Polydeuces and
Amykos (24a, 25a)
Pankration: ‘all-powerful’
Violence (40d)
Rules and Prohibitions, f. 98
(37z)
f. 96, 97
f. 102
Ponos: ‘pain’, f. 100
Hercules (Herakles)
Palaimon, f. 99