About this Event
8th GHI Forum
【Abstract】
Leonard Muellner will discuss the political and social functions of Ancient Greek athletics in a cross-cultural perspective. Ancient Greece was a highly differentiated political space, consisting of a wide variety of city-states each with different religious calendars, law codes, constitutions, etc. These communities were in principle in a state of war with one another (understanding that 'war' could be ritualized combat rather than actual fighting), so that enabling participation in games across the city-states required a global truce. Greeks derived a common identity from their participation in athletics. However, there were no team games, only one person was awarded a prize in each contest, and the skills involved were at their core individualized warrior skills in a ritualized (that is, theoretically, non-fatal) context. Muellner will go on to compare this elitist way of gaming with the way sport functions in other cultures, including contemporary settings historically derived from it.
The word stadium—or stadion in ancient Greek—originally did not refer to any colossal structure built for sports events. Rather, it referred to a sacred distance that was measured out for the first time in a sequence of athletic events held in honor of the god Zeus at Olympia, site of the ancient Olympics. That event was a footrace. As we see it represented in the ancient vase-painting that we show as the featured image for this presentation. But such footracing was not only for male athletes. As argued by Gregory Nagy, partly on the basis of an ancient bronze figurine, featured as a secondary illustration, there was also footracing, in honor of the goddess Hera, for girls selected from three age classes ranging from younger to older. At both male and female athletic events, as also argued, the humanism in the ritual dimension of athletics shines through.
This forum series was made possible with support from MITHIC and the Literature Section at MIT! We look forward to seeing you at our events!
The GHI Team
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