Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks

264 Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks
Winners and Losers
On the fifth and final day, prizes of olive wreaths were awarded
to the victors. The victor first bound a band of wool around his
head and the official then placed the wreath upon it. There were
no prizes for those who finished second or third. Victors were permitted
to erect statues in the sanctuary and were feted lavishly by
their own cities when they returned home. Some were granted free
meals at public expense for the rest of their lives. States whose athletes
won prizes gained enormous prestige. Alkibiades, who placed
first, second, and fourth in the chariot race, boasted that “the Greeks
believed that Athens had even greater power than was the case
because of my success in the Olympic Games, although earlier they
had thought they had entirely worn us out in the war” (Thukydides
6.16.2). The most successful state was Elis, where Olympia was
situated. Elis produced the first recorded Olympic victor, a baker
named Koribos, in 776 b.c.e. Sparta was also prominent, whereas
Athens, even at the height of its power in the mid-fifth century
b.c.e. , won far fewer victories. The most successful athlete was
Milon of Kroton, who won the wrestling prize in five successive
Olympiads between 536 and 520 b.c.e. Milon, a notorious show-off,
used to challenge people to bend back his little finger—apparently
no one could. He was also in the habit of tying a band around his
head, taking a deep breath, and snapping the band with the aid of
the veins of his head (Pausanias 6.14.7).
We should also spare a thought for the losers, whose plight is
described as follows by Pindar:
They, when their mothers meet them, have no sweet laughter around them,
arousing delight. But in back streets they cower, out of their enemies’ way,
bitten by disaster. (Pythian 8.85—87)
Women were not permitted to enter the sanctuary of Zeus while
the games were in progress. Pausanias (5.6.7) tells us that the ban
was introduced after a woman called Kallipateira managed to disguise
herself as an Olympic trainer in order to watch her son compete.
She was exposed (literally) when she jumped over the trainers’
enclosure. The judges decided not to punish her out of deference to
her brothers, her father, and her son, all of whom had been Olympic
victors. Although women could not watch the games in progress,
handsome athletes had their fans and followers, who hung about