games implied from thence, that only honour, and not mean and sordid interest ought to be the motive of great actions. Of what were men not capable, accustomed to act solely from so glorious a principle?* We have seen in the Persian war, that Tigranes, one of the most considerable captains in the army of Xerxes, having heard the prizes in the Grecian games described, cried out with astonishment, addressing himself to Mardonius who commanded in chief, Heavens! against what men are you leading us? insensi! le to interest, they combat only for glory! Which exclamation, though looked upon by Xerxes as an effect of abject fear, abounds with sense and judgment. It was from the same principle the Romans, while they bestowed upon other occasions, crowns of gold of great value, persisted always in giving only a wreath of oaken leaves to him who had saved the life of a citizen. " manners, worthy of eternal remembrance!" cried Pliny, in relating this laudable custom; O grandeur, truly Roman, that would assign no other reward but honour, for the preservation of a citizen! a service, indeed, above all reward; thereby sufficiently evincing their opinion, that it was criminal to save a man's life from the motive of lucre and interest!" O mores æternos, que tanta opera honore solo donaverint; et cum reliquas coronas auro commendarent, salutem civis in pretio esse noluerint, clara professione servari quidem hominem nefas esse lucri causa! Among all the Grecian games, the Olympic held undeniably the first rank, and that for three reasons: they were sacred to Jupiter, the greatest of the gods; instituted by Hercules, the first of the heroes; and celebrated with more pomp and magnificence, amidst a greater concourse of spectators, attracted from all parts, than any of the rest. If Pausanias may be believed, women were prohibited to be present at them upon pain of death; and during their continuance, it was ordained, that no woman should approach the place where the games were celebrated, or pass on that side of the river Alpheus. One only was so bold as to violate this law, and slipped in disguise among the combatants. She was tried for the offence, and would have suffered for it, according to the law, if the judges, in regard to her father, her brother, and her son, who had all been victors in the Olympic games, had not pardoned her offence and saved her life.§ This law was perfectly conformable to the Grecian manners, among whom the ladies were very reserved, seldom appeared in public, had separate apartments, called Gynæcea, and never ate at table with the men when strangers were present. It was certainly inconsistent with decency to admit them at some of the games, as those of wrestling, and the Pancratium, in which the combatants fought naked. The same Pausanias tells us in another place, that the priestess of Ceres had an honourable seat in these games, and that virgins were not denied the liberty of being present at them. For my part, I cannot conceive the reason of such inconsistency, which indeed seems incredible. The Greeks thought nothing comparable to the victory in these games. They looked upon it as the perfection of glory, and did not believe it permitted to mortals to desire any thing beyond it. Cicero assures us, that with them it was no less honourable than the consular dignity in its original splendour with the ancient Romans. And in another place he says, that to conquer at Olympia was almost, in the estimation of the Grecians, more great and glorious, thar to receive the honour of a triumph at Rome.** Horace speaks in still stronger terms upon this kind of victory. He is not afraid to *Herod. 1. viii. c. 26. † Παπαὶ Μαρδόνιε, κόινους ὑπ ̓ ἄνδρας ήγαγες μαχησομένως, ἡμέας, οἱ ὁ περί χρημα. των τὸν ἀγῶνα ποιόνται, ἀλλὰ περὶ ἀρετῆς. Plin. 1. xvi. c. 4. Pausan. 1. v. p. 297. Pausan. 1. vi. p. 382. TOlympiorum victoria, Græcis consulatus ille antiquus videbatur.-Túscul Quest. lib. ii. n. 41. Olympionicum esse apud Græcis prope majus fuit et gloriosus, quam Romæ triumphasse.-Pro Flacnum. xxxi. say, that it exalts the victor above human nature; they were no longer men, but gods.*. We shall see hereafter what extraordinary honours were paid to the victor, of which one of the most affecting was to date the year with his name. Nothing could more effectually enliven their endeavours, and make them regardless of expenses, than the assurance of immortalizing their names, which, for the future, would be annexed to the calendar, and in the front of all laws made in the same year with the victory. To this motive may be added, the joy of knowing, that their praises would be celebrated by the most famous poets, and share in the entertainment of the most illustrious assemblies; for these odes were sung in every house, and had a part in every entertainment. What could be a more powerful incentive to a people, who had no other object and aim than that of human glory? I shall confine myself upon this head to the Olympic games, which continued five days; and shall describe, in as brief a manner as possible, the several kinds of combats of which they were composed. M. Burette has treated this subject in several dissertations, printed in the Memoirs of the Academy of Belles Lettres; wherein purity, perspicuity, and elegance of style, are united with profound erudition. I make no scruple in appropriating to my use the riches of my brethren; and in what I have already said upon the Ŏlympic games, have made very free with the late Abbé Massieu's remarks upon the odes of Pindar. The combats which had the greatest share in the solemnity of the public games, were boxing, wrestling, the pancratium, the discus or quoit, and racing. To these may be added the exercises of leaping, throwing the dart, and that of the trochus or wheel; but as these were neither important, nor of any great reputation, I shall content myself with having only mentioned them in this place. For the better methodizing the particulars of these games and exercises, it will be necessary to begin with an account OF THE ATHLETE, OR COMBATANTS. THE term athlete is derived from the Greek word &os, which signifies labour, combat. This name was given to those who exercised themselves with design to dispute the prizes in the public games. The art by which they formed themselves for these encounters, was called gymnastic, from the athletæ practising naked. Those who were designed for this profession, frequented, from their most tender age, the Gymnasia or Palæstræ, which were a kind of academies maintained, for that purpose, at the public expense. In these places, such young people were under the direction of different masters, who employed the most effectual methods to inure their bodies for the fatigues of the public games, and to train them for the combats. The regimen they were under was very hard and severe. At first they had no other nourishment than dried figs, nuts, soft cheese, and a gross heavy sort of bread called μála. They were absolutely forbidden the use of wine, and enjoined continence; which Horace expresses thus: St. Paul, by an allusion to the athletæ, exhorts the Corinthians, near whose city the Isthmian games were celebrated, to a sober and penitent life. Those who strive, says he, for the mastery, are temperate in all things: now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, we an incorruptible. Tertullian uses the same thought to encourage the martyrs. He makes a comparison from what the hopes of victory made the athletæ endure. He repeats the severe and painful exercises they were obliged to undergo; the contínual denial and constraint in which they passed the best years of their lives; and the voluntary privation which they imposed upon themselves of all that was most affecting and grateful to their passions.* It is true, the athletæ did not always observe so severe a regimen, but at length substituted in its stead a voracity and indolence extremely remote from it. The athlete, before their exercises were rubbed with oils and ointments, to make their bodies more supple and vigorous. At first they made use of a belt, with an apron or scarf fastened to it, for their more decent appearance in the combats; but one of the combatants happening to lose the victory by this covering's falling off, that accident was the occasion of sacrificing modesty to convenience, and retrenching the apron for the future. The athletæ were only naked in some exercises, as wrestling, boxing, the pancratium, and the foot-race. They practised a kind of noviciate in the Gymnasia for ten months, to accomplish themselves in the several exercises by assiduous application; and this they did in the presence of such as curiosity or idleness conducted to look on. But when the celebration of the Olympic games drew nigh, the athlete who were to appear in them were kept to double exercise. Before they were admitted to combat, other proofs were required. As to birth, none but Greeks were to be received. It was also necessary that their manners should be unexceptionable, and their condition free. No foreigner was admitted to combat in the Olympic games; and when Alexander, the son of Amyntas, king of Macedon, presented himself to dispute the prize, his competitors, without any regard to the royal dignity, opposed his reception as a Macedonian, and consequently a barbarian and a stranger; nor could the judges be prevailed upon to admit him till he had proved in due form, his family originally descended from the Argives. The persons who presided in the games, called Agonothetæ, Athlothetœ, and Hellanodica, registered the name and country of each champion; and upon the opening of the games, a herald proclaimed the names of the combatants. They were then made to take an oath, that they would religiously observe the several laws prescribed in each kind of combat, and to do nothing contrary to the established orders and regulations of the games. Fraud, artifice, and excessive violence, were absolutely prohibited; and the maxim so generally received elsewhere, that it is indifferent whether an enemy is conquered by deceit or valour, was banished from these combats. The address of a combatant expert in all the niceties of his art, who knows how to shift and ward dexterously, to put the change upon his adversary with art and subtlety, and to improve the least advantages, must not be confounded here with the cowardly and knavish cunning of one, who, without regard to the laws prescribed, employs the most unfair means to vanquish his competitor. Those who disputed the prize in the several kinds of combats, drew lots for their precedency in them. It is time to bring our champions to blows, and to run over the different kinds of combats, in which they exercised themselves. OF WRESTLING. WRESTLING is one of the most ancient exercises of which we have any knowledge, having been practised in the time of the patriarchs, as the wrest * Nempe enim et athlete segregantur ad strictiorem disciplinam, ut robori ædificando vacent; conti mentur a luxuria, a cibis lætioribus, a potu jucundiore; coguntur, cruciantur, fatigantur.-Tertul. ad Martyr. Dolus an virtus, quis in hoste requir...? ling of the angel with Jacob proves. Jacob supported the angel's attack so vigorously, that the latter, perceiving that he could not throw so rough a wrestler, was induced to make him lame, by touching the sinew of his thigh, which immediately shrunk up.* Wrestling among the Greeks, as well as other nations, was practised at first with simplicity, little art, and in a natural manner; the weight of the body, and the strength of the muscles, having more share in it, than address and skill. Theseus was the first that reduced it to method, and refined it with the rules of art. He was also the first who established the public schools called Palestre, where the young people had masters to instruct them in it. The wrestlers before they began their combats, were rubbed all over in a rough manner, and afterwards anointed with oils, which added to the strength and flexibility of their limbs. But as this unction, by making the skin too slippery, rendered it difficult for them to take hold of each other, they remedied that inconvenience, sometimes by rolling themselves in the dust of the Palæstræ, sometimes by throwing a fine sand upon each other, kept for that purpose in the Xystæ, or porticoes of the Gymnasia. Thus prepared, the wrestlers began their combat. They were matched two against two, and sometimes several couples contended at the same time. In this combat, the whole aim and design of the wrestlers was to throw their adversary upon the ground. Both strength and art were employed to this purpose they seized each other by the arms, drew forwards, pushed backwards, used many distortions and twistings of the body; locking their limbs into each other's, seizing by the neck, throttling, pressing in their arms, struggling, plying on all sides, lifting from the ground, dashing their heads toge ther like rams, and twisting one another's necks. The most considerable ad vantage in the wrestler's art, was to make himself master of his adversary's legs, of which a fall was the immediate consequence. From whence Plautus says, in his Pseudolus, speaking of wine, He is a dangerous wrestler, he presently takes one by the heels. The Greek terms oσ and regie, and the Latin word supplantare, seem to imply, that one of these arts consisted in stooping down to seize the antagonist under the soles of his feet, and in raising them up to give him a fall. In this manner the athlete wrestled standing, the combat ending with the fall of one of the competitors. But when it happened that the wrestler who was down drew his adversary along with him, either by art or accident, the combat continued upon the sand, the antagonists tumbling and twining with each other in a thousand different ways, till one of them got uppermost, and compelled the other to ask quarter, and confess himself vanquished. There was a third sort of wrestling called Axgxcious, from the athlete's using only their hands in it, without taking hold of the body as in the other kinds; and this exercise served as a prelude to the greater combat. It consisted in intermingling their fingers and in squeezing them with all their force; in pushing one another, by joining the palms of their hands together; in twist ing their fingers, wrists, and other joints of the arm, without the assistance of any other member; and the victory was his who obliged his opponent to ask quarter. The combatants were to fight three times successively, and to throw their antagonists at least twice, before the prize could be adjudged to them. Homer describes the wrestling of Ajax and Ulysses; Ovid, that of Hercules and Achelous; Lucan, of Hercules and Antaus; and Statius, in his Thebaid, that of Tydeus and Agylleus. The wrestlers of greatest reputation among the Greeks, were wilo of Crotona, whose history I have related elsewhere at large, and Polydamas. The latter, alone and without arms, killed a furious lion upon Mount Olympus, in Gen. xxxii. 24. † Captat pedes primum, luctator dolosus est. Iliad. 1. xxiii. v. 708, &c. Ovid. Metam. 1. ix, v. 31, &c. Phars. 1. iv. v. 612. Stat. 1. vi. v. 847. imitation of Hercules, whom he proposed to himself as a model in this action Another time, having seized a bull by one of his hinder legs, the beast could not get loose without leaving his hoof in his hands. He could hold a chariot behind, while the coachman whipped his horses in vain to make them go forward. Darius Nothus, king of Persia, hearing of his prodigious strength, was desirous of seeing him, and invited him to Susa. Three soldiers of that prince's guard, and of that band which the Persians call immortal, esteemed the most warlike of their troops, were ordered to fall upon him. Our champion fought and killed them all three. OF BOXING, OR THE CEstus. BOXING is a combat at blows with the fist, from whence it derives its name. The combatants covered their fists with a kind of offensive arms, called cestus, and their heads with a sort of leather cap, to defend their temples and ears, which were most exposed to blows, and to deaden their violence. The cestus was a kind of gauntlet or glove, made of straps of leather, and plated with brass, lead or iron. Their use was to strengthen the hands of the combatants, and to add violence to their blows. Sometimes the athlete came immediately to the most violent blows, and began their charge in the most furious manner. Sometimes whole hours passed in harassing and fatiguing each other, by a continual extension of their arms, rendering each other's blows ineffectual, and endeavouring in that manner of defence to keep off their adversary. But when they fought with the utmost fury, they aimed chiefly at the head and face, which parts they were most careful to defend, by either avoiding or parrying the blows made at them. When a combatant came to throw himself with all his force and vigour upon another, they had a surprising address in avoiding the attack, by a nimble turn of the body, which threw the imprudent adversary down, and deprived him of the victory. However fierce the combatants were against each other, their being exhausted by the length of the combat would frequently reduce them to the necessity of making a truce, upon which the battle was suspended for some minutes, that were employed in recovering from their fatigue, and rubbing off the sweat in which they were bathed; after which they renewed the fight, till one of them, by letting fall his arms through weakness, or by swooning away, explained that he could no longer support the pain or fatigue, and desired quarter; which was confessing himself vanquished. Boxing was one of the most rude and dangerous of the gymnastic combats; because, besides the danger of being crippled, the combatants ran the hazard of their lives. They soinetines fell down dead, or dying, upon the sand; though that seldom happened, except the vanquished person persisted in not acknowledging his defeat: yet it was common for them to quit the fight with a countenance so disfigured, that it was not easy to know them afterwards; carrying away with them the sad marks of their vigorous resistance, such as bruises and contusions in the face, the loss of an eye, their teeth knocked out, their jaws broken, or some more considerable fracture. We find in the poets, both Latin and Greek, several descriptions of this kind of combat. In Homer, that of Epcus and Euryalus; in Theocritus, of Pollux and Amycus; in Appollonius Rhodius, the same battle of Pollux and Amycu3; in Virgil, that of Dares and Entellus; and in Statius, and Valerius Flaccus, of several other combatants.* OF THE PANCRATIUM. THE pancratium was so called from two Greek words, which signify that the whcle force of the body was necessary for succeeding in it. It * Dioscor. Idyl. xxii. Argonaut. lib. ii. Æneid. 1. v. Thebaid. i. vii. Argonaut. 1. iv. VOL. 1. C |