Philipos Ross

Philipos Ross

Today we went to visit the historically famous Olympic stadium. The weather wasn't the best, but the history and scenery overcame that. A little bit about the history of Olympia: Fedias created the sacred statue of Zeus, which is considered one of the seven ancient wonders of the world. The Olympic Games were created to be a sign of peace of Greece. They were significant because when the Olympic Games were being held, the cities of Greece stopped fighting, or else the oracle of Delphi would not communicate with them. Now, the athletes who competed were considered amateurs, common folk. The professionals were the coaches for these athletes when training for the games. Women were not allowed to compete in the Olympic Games, or even spectate because of the fact that the men competed naked. If women were seen spectating the events, they were condemned to death. The reason for competing naked was because the games were held in July, and temperatures reached  upwards of 120 degrees Fahrenheit. If you won, you received no money, but pride a statue of you in your city. The games were in honor of Zeus, and the 5 Olympic Rings represent the 5 uncles who protected and raised Zeus before he went to overthrow his father, Cronos. It's hard to fathom what the ruins looked like, because now everything is destroyed due to the various earthquakes throughout thousands of years. You really have to use your imagination to piece together in your mind what it looked like back in the 4th century BC. The last part of the tour we were able to actually run a hundred meter dash in the stadium, which was a great experience, even though Dr. Forti smoked me rather effortlessly.