The Victor's Crown
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The Victor’s Crown This page intentionally left blank The Victor’s Crown A History of Ancient Sport from Homer to Byzantium David Potter 1 3 Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further Oxford University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam First published as a hardcover original in Great Britain by Quercus 21 Bloomsbury Square, London WCIA 2NS Copyright © 2012 David Potter First published as a paperback Original by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 www.oup.com Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Potter, D. S. (David Stone), 1957– The victor’s crown : a history of ancient sport from Homer to Byzantium / David Potter. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-0-19-984275-9—ISBN 978-0-19-984273-5 1. Sports—History. 2. Greece—Civilization. 3. Byzantine Empire—Civilization. I. Title. GV573.P67 2011 796'.09—dc22 2011008813 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper Contents List of Illustrations ix Maps xii Preface xv Then and Now xvii PART 1: ASHES, LINEN AND THE ORIGINS OF SPORT 1: Introduction 3 2: Homer and the Bronze Age 13 3: Homer and Sport 24 PART 2: OLYMPIA 4: From Myth to History 37 5: Olympia in 480 BC 49 6: The Olympic Games of 476 BC 55 7: The Festival Approaches 62 8: Winning 67 The equestrian events 67 The pentathlon and the foot races 73 Nudity 76 Pain and suffering 78 9: Remembering Victory 89 v contents The athlete as hero 93 10: The Emergence of the Panhellenic Cycle 98 PART 3: THE WORLD OF THE GYMNASIUM 11: Sport and Civic Virtue 109 12: Beroia 127 13: Getting in Shape and Turning Pro 137 PART 4: ROMAN GAMES 14: Greece Meets Rome 163 15: Kings and Games 169 16: Rome and Italy 179 17: Actors and Gladiators 186 18: Caesar, Antony, Augustus and the Games 209 PART 5: IMPERIAL GAMES 19: Watching 225 20: The Fan’s Experience 229 21: Expectations 233 22: Crowd Noise 237 23: Dreaming of Sport 242 24: Images of Sport 246 25: Women’s Sports 252 26: Gladiators 258 Life as a gladiator 259 Training and ranking 262 Dying 264 Choosing to be a gladiator 269 27: Charioteers 273 vi contents 28: Athletes 278 Athletic guilds 279 Cheating 286 29: Running the Show 288 Administration 292 Athletics 300 Epilogue: The Long End of an Era 308 Bibliography 321 Classical Sources 350 Notes 359 Index 407 vii This page intentionally left blank List of Illustrations 1. Evans’ reconstruction of the Taureador fresco. 2. Marinatos’ reconstruction of the Taureador fresco. 3. Terracotta image of a charioteer and horses from Olympia. © Olympia Archaeological Museum 4. Hoplitodromos. © Indiana University Museum 5. Panathenaic amphora with discus thrower and teacher by Euthymides, Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. © Scala / Ministero Beni e Att. Culturali 6. Amphora with black figures engaged in a stadion race by Kleophrades, 500 - 490 BCE, Paris, Musée du Louvre. © Scala / White Images 7. Amphora depicting the end of a boxing match. © National Archaeological Museum, Athens 8. Two wrestlers. Hellenistic Bronze statuette from Alexandria, 2nd century BCE, Paris, Musée du Louvre. © akg-images / Erich Lessing 9. Wrestler about to drop his opponent on his head. Hellenistic Bronze statuette from Alexandria, 2nd century BCE, Paris, Musée du Louvre. © akg-images / Erich Lessing 10. Reconstruction of the Olympic site as it was in 476. © Matthew Harrington 11. The judge’s box in the stadion at Olympia. © Matthew Harrington ix the victor’s crown 12. Erotic scene depicting two male athletes engaged in homo- sexual intercourse. Terracotta black figure amphora, 5th century BCE, Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy. © Vanni / Art Resource, NY 13. Panathenaic prize amphora depicting a boxing contest, signed by the potter Kittos, made in Athens c. 367-366 BC. © The Trustees of the British Museum 14. Aerial view of the site of Olympia. © CORBIS / Yann Arthus- Bertrand 15. Paestum tomb painting of Gladiatorial combat. Lucanian funerary fresco, 4th–3rd century BCE. © Alinari / Topfoto 16. Paestum tomb painting of a chariot race and gladiatorial combat. Lucanian funerary fresco. 4th–3rd-century BCE © Alinari / Topfoto 17. The costly munus (public show and gift) offered by Magerius. Roman mosaic from Smirat (near Moknine). Mid 3rd-cen- tury CE. © CORBIS / Ruggero Vanni 18. Reconstruction of the amphitheatre. © Matthew Harrington 19. Restoration of the early 3rd-century CE gladiator mosaic at the Wadi Ledbda by Mohammed Ali Drogui. Leptis Magna, Libya. © akg-images / Gilles Mermet 20. Dar Buc Ammera Mosaic © Sebastia Giralt 21. Marble relief with female gladiators, Roman, 1st-2nd century AD. From Halikarnassos (modern Bodrum, Turkey). © The Trustees of the British Museum 22. Tombstone of Paralos and wife, Hierapolis. 23. The execution scene from Hierapolis x This page intentionally left blank BLACK SEA Danube ARMENIA Byzantium Dyrrhachium THRACE Thasos MACEDON Beroia Pergamon S E L E U ASIA C I D E M P I R E Thermopylae Ephesus Delphi Athens Antioch Corinth CILICIA Nemea Isthmia Delos Xanthus Olympia SYRIA ACHAIA Sparta RHODES CYPRUS CRETE JUDEA R A N E A N S E A I T E R Jerusalem M E D Alexandria CYRENAICA PTOLEMAIC KINGDOM OF EGYPT Oxyrhynchus 0 300 miles 0 450 miles The Eastern Mediterranean (with significant athletic sites mentioned in the text) BRITAIN London GERMANY R h i n e Trier ATLANTIC OCEAN GAUL PANNONIA Verona Sirmium MOESIA BLACK SEA I L be Arles ITALY L Danu Y R THRACE Marseilles I A SPAIN Adrianople Byzantium CORSICA MACEDONIA Nicomedia ARMENIA Tarraco ROME Capua Thessalonica Pompeii Nicea Cordoba Naples Pergamon Italica SARDINIA ASIA Croton Smyrna Athens Ephesus Hierapolis CILICA Antioch Aphrodisias Locris SICILY Olympia RHODES Carthage Gela Syracuse MAURETANIA CYPRUS M E D I T E R R A N E A A N S E Jerusalem Alexandria CYRENAICA EGYPT 0 300 miles 0 450 km Oxyrhynchus The Roman Empire This page intentionally left blank Preface This book began some twenty years ago when my friend Ludwig Koenen, then chair of my department, asked me to take over a long-standing course on ancient sport. The many students who have taken the course over the years have continued to spark my interest in the subject, and I want here to register my profound appreciation both of them and of the generations of graduate students who have borne much of the teaching workload with me and helped the course to evolve. I am very grateful to Richard Mil- bank at Quercus who took this project on, to Richard Milner who has seen it into press, Josh Ireland who has overseen production and for the exceptional talent of Sue Phillpott who copy edited the book. In the last five years it has been my great good fortune to serve as a member of the University of Michigan’s Advisory Board on Intercollegiate Athletics, and, as chairman of the governing com- mittee of the faculty senate for one of those years, to look at the business of sport with a fresh eye. I am profoundly grateful to Pres- ident Mary Sue Coleman and Bill Martin, the athletic director while this book was being written, for their support in these tasks. I have also had the opportunity to meet and work with some truly remark- able coaches and athletic administrators, including Lloyd Carr, Carol xv preface Hutchins, Ronni Bernstein (who also revived my tennis game), Judy Van Horn, Mike Stevenson, Greg Harden and Bitsy Ritt, as well as my colleagues on the board, Bruno Giordani and Stan Berent. In writing this book I have received exemplary assistance from Nellie Kippley (a veteran of Roman sport and former captain of the Michigan Women’s Gymnastics Team) who helped me under- stand modern training techniques and the experience of athletes at the highest level of intercollegiate competition. I have also received invaluable assistance from Matt Newman, a student in the UM’s Graduate Program in Classical Philology. Others who offered sage advice on earlier versions include Mike Sampson, Karen Acton and Nate Andrade. I am also enormously grateful to a number of colleagues, especially Arthur Verhoogt, who read most of the manu - script, Sara Forsdyke, who guided me through the history of Greece, and Chris Ratté, a sure guide on archaeological issues. My most important source of support and comfort has been, as ever, my family – Ellen, Claire and Natalie. xvi Then and Now It is the night of 9 July 2006. In Berlin, Fabio Grosso’s penalty kick eludes French goalkeeper Fabien Barthez. The huge crowd in Rome’s Circo Massimo erupts. Italy has won its fourth World Cup in front of 260 million spectators, drawn all around the world to television sets or giant screens such as those in the Circo. Never had so many human beings watched a single event. But it is with those gathered in the Circo Massimo that we will begin. They link our world with another which, though long gone, may still, in many ways, help us understand our own.