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the chain of the revivals of the experiences of ancient times. ' (13) His "Hellenocentric"
(14) approach, which allocates a considerable educational and political task to the
"coming Third Humanism" (15) , was not without influence on Diem, who reports that
he "listened diligently" (16) to Jaeger at the Berlin university. Diem contributions to
the design of the Olympic festival, too, should be considered against the
background of Third Humanism as propagated by Jaeger.
The arts of the 19th century took up the torch theme in many variations. The
most famous one may be mentioned here. On the Champ de Mars in Paris, during
the International Exhibition of 1878, Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi showed a huge
torso of his sculpture. "La Liberté éclairant le monde". It was conceived in remembrance
to the American "Declaration of Independence" by French republicans
and was finally erected in New York in 1886, known to us as "Statue of Liberty".
Its torch had already been sent from Paris Philadelphia to the Centennial
Exhibition in 1876.
Olympic Humanism
The metaphoric tradition of the torch also reached the Olympic Movement very
early. The commemorative plaque of the Exposition Universelle de 1900, that also
included the second Olympic Games of the modern era, shows a female representation
of the 19th Century handing over the torch to the genius of the 20th century.
Torch motifs can be also be found in the winner's medal and certificates.
Pierre de Coubertin's works contain the metaphorical use of the ancient torch
theme in various places, among others in the ceremonious words spoken at the
banquet at the end of the Stockholm Olympic Games on 27 June 1912, when he
looked forward to the 1916 Berlin Games and exclaimed.
"And now, Gentlemen, through our mediation a great people has received the
torch of the Olympiads from you hands, and has thereby undertaken to preserve
and if possible to quicken its precious flame, (17)
Instead of stressing the succession of the generations, Coubertin stressed the
changing of the nations who pass on the Olympic Flame:
"Should our youth temporarily let the Olympic Torch fall from their hands, other
young people on the other side of the world would be prepared to pick it up
again. (18)
Coubertin's maxim,
"May the Olympic Torch follow its course throughout the ages for the good of a
humanity, ever more ardent, courageous and pure," (19)
was written on the Scoreboard as a final tableau in Los Angeles in 1932, thus
looking back to Athens and forward to Berlin.
In a transferred sense, Coubertin can be called the "re-igniter" of the Olympic
Fire. It has not been possible, however, to identify whose idea it was to have an
Olympic Fire burning during the Games. (20) For the first time in the history of the
modern Olympic Games the fire burned at the Amsterdam Stadium in 1928 as a
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