Patterns of Politics in Ancient Greek Athletics

Greek athletics were of high political significance in view of their place in religion and communal festivals. This is reviewed in terms of votive offerings; the status of a group, a ruler, or an individual within a community; interstate rivalries, colonization and state formation; elite status, kudos, and political capital, especially in chariot-racing. The examples of Cleisthenes of Sikyon and the Alcmaeonids of Athens, among others, are discussed. The rivalry of Athens and Sparta in athletics and chariot events is also examined, e.g. the cases of the Spartans Lichas, Cynisca, and Agesilaus, and the Athenian Alcibiades. The participation of ‘peripheral’ Greek cities (Italy, Sicily, Cyrene) in Panhellenic games bolstered their Greek identity and served their rulers too. Macedonian rulers, e.g. Alexander I, Philip II and Alexander the Great, notably took part in Greek games for the fifth century on, and so asserted their Greek identity and their domain. The Panathenaic Games served political aims not only for Athenian elite, but also for Ptolemies and Macedonians.

Etruscan Events

Sports are a well-represented motif in Etruscan iconography since the Orientalizing Period, with a predilection for horse racing and boxing bouts performed to music. Contrary to current opinion, Etruscan sport shows strong originality in comparison with a so-called Greek model on many points, such as technical aspects of chariot-racing, the status of athletes, the presence of women in public space; its influence on Roman ludi has been considerable. Beside funerary games organized in a gentilician or clan-based framework, the Etruscans also were acquainted with sacred games, in particular the Pan-Etruscan games in which the members of the League of Twelve Cities competed in the sanctuary of Voltumna at Orvieto.

Curse Tablets

In Greco-Roman antiquity the intense competition (agōn) between opponents in the sporting arena was echoed by an equally fierce competition of magical materials inside and outside the venue. Curse tablets (Gr. katadesmoi, L. defixiones), phylacteries, protective magical texts worn on or near the person, and other magical materials, symbols, and rituals all competed with each other to advance or retard the performance of the competitors in the event. Extant tablets come from the early imperial period to the 6th century ce, but their use in the classical and Hellenistic periods is likely. The extant sport-related tablets contain curses relating to wrestling and running, beast-hunting in the arena (venatio), and chariot-racing in the circus, with tablets relating to the latter predominating. As chariot-racing in the empire became an increasingly high-stakes event and connected with competition among the factions, their supporters, and the ruling elite, the practice of magic to influence outcomes of the races is increasingly mentioned in sources of the period as a source of concern.

Sport and Spectacle in the Greek Bronze Age

e (including bull-catching, bull-leaping, and bull-sacrifice), Minoan and Mycenaean frescoes, vase paintings, and stone relief vases depict boxing and wrestling, and competitions with special clothing, protective gloves, and physical restraints or handicaps. Less well known are the depictions of archers, foot-racers, and acrobats. Competition may arguably include artistic representations of game boards and gaming, dance performances, and processions, and descriptions of poetry and musical contests in Homer and Hesiod and of discus throwing in mythology. There is also architectural evidence for enclosing the central courts in the Minoan palaces for protection and seating of spectators. Depictions on eighth-century-bce pottery testify to chariot-racing, musical performances, horsemanship, and the hunt. We also consider passim the participation of women in sport and competition, drawing upon Aegean Bronze Age representations of women archers, hunters, and charioteers, and upon classical mythology for their participation in early foot-races, wrestling, and the hunt.

‘Horse Race, Rich in Woes’: Orestes’ Chariot Race and the Erinyes in Sophocles’ Electra

This article offers a new, ironic reading of the false narrative of Orestes’ chariot accident in Sophocles’ Electra (680–763). It argues that the speech exploits an established connection between the ancestral evils of the Atreids and the thematic nexus of horses, chariot racing and disaster to evoke Orestes’ flight from the Erinyes following the matricide. Focusing on the language and structure of the narrative as well as drawing on other versions of the story (notably the surviving plays by Aeschylus and Euripides), the article demonstrates, in contrast to previous readings, that the speech is much more than an over-elaborate means to an end. Instead, in an ominous and profoundly ironic twist, the Paedagogus’ fictional narrative of the chariot race offers a possible vision of the trials awaiting the real Orestes. The matricide and murder, far from ending the ancestral woes of the Atreids, may well bring about Orestes’ pursuit by the Erinyes.

Conclusion

The Conclusion reviews the role of material culture in mediating imaginations of place in the Roman empire, with reference to the Itinerary Cups describing journeys from Spain to Rome, the Spectacle Cups depicting chariot racing and gladiatorial combat, the Fort Pans documenting Hadrian’s Wall, and the Bay Bottles visualizing Baiae and Puteoli. To demonstrate the flexibility of the book’s analytical framework, two final sets of artifacts are presented. One focuses on spectacle souvenirs that were made in Roman Spain and include the date of the event and the name of its sponsor with unusual specificity. The other is an ornamental metal vessel that was excavated in a distant province, yet was created in workshops around Rome’s Circus Flaminius and bears that place name as a mark of prestigious craftmanship. Whereas the book’s introduction constructed an interdisciplinary analytical framework, the Conclusion reconsiders the place of material culture in Roman studies.

CHARIOT RACING AS THE ENTERTAINMENT FORM OF ANCIENT ROME EVENTS IN THE CULTURAL STUDIES DIMENSION

The purpose of the article is the introduction into the cultural discourse of analytically processed and summarized information on the genesis and evolution of chariot racing as the form of entertainment events in ancient Rome, their functional features, specific features of mass events of Antiquity in the context of entertainment culture of Rome. The methodological basis consisted of the methods of critical analysis of cultural, historical, and literary sources, specific and historical analysis, and interdisciplinary synthesis, induction, and deduction. The problematic and chronological, system and structural, comparative, descriptive methods and methods of social and phenomenological analysis were applied from specific and scientific methods. Scientific novelty. The article analyzes the genesis and evolution of chariot racing as a form of events in the context of entertainment culture in ancient Rome. Based on the ancient literary reflection, through the prism of works of culturologists, philosophers, historians, poets, writers of the ancient Rome Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, annals of Publius Cornelius Tacitus, Cassius Dio, ethic works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca, letters of Gaius Pliny the Younger, poetry pages of Publius Ovidius Naso, epigrams of Marcus Valerius Martialis and others. The author revealed the essence and content of chariot racing as an entertainment form of events in ancient Rome, statistics, and specific features of entertainment events and instruments of ruling the Roman emperors. The author describes the moral aspects of chariot racing in the context of the entertainment culture of antiquity. Conclusions. The place of entertainment culture of Antiquity in the system of cultural knowledge and cultural tradition of their social universe is revealed. The transformations of chariot racing as a social and humanitarian experience of ancient society, the political instrument of government in Rome are explored. The role of entertainment of Antiquity for modern cultural practices is established.

A Cultural History of Sport in Antiquity

A Cultural History of Sport in Antiquity covers the period 800 BCE to 600 CE. From the founding of the Olympics and Rome’s celebratory games, sport permeated the cultural life of Greco-Roman antiquity almost as it does our own. Gymnasiums, public baths, monumental arenas, and circuses for chariot racing were constructed, and athletic contests proliferated. Sports-themed household objects were very popular, whilst the exploits of individual athletes, gladiators, and charioteers were immortalized in poetry, monuments, and the mosaic floors of the wealthy. This rich sporting culture attests to the importance of leisure among the middle and upper classes of the Greco-Roman world, but by 600 CE rising costs, barbarian invasions, and Christianity had swept it all away. The 6 volume set of the Cultural History of Sport presents the first comprehensive history from classical antiquity to today, covering all forms and aspects of sport and its ever-changing social, cultural, political, and economic context and impact. The themes covered in each volume are the purpose of sport; sporting time and sporting space; products, training, and technology; rules and order; conflict and accommodation; inclusion, exclusion, and segregation; minds, bodies, and identities; representation.

РОЛЬ ФИЗИЧЕСКОЙ КУЛЬТУРЫ И СПОРТА В ПОДГОТОВКЕ МАССОВОГО ПРИЗЫВНОГО КОНТИНГЕНТА В ВИЗАНТИЙСКОЙ ИМПЕРИИ

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