A Companion to Sport and Spectacle in Greek and Roman Antiquity by Kyle Donald G. Christesen Paul & Donald G. Kyle

Author:Kyle, Donald G., Christesen, Paul & Donald G. Kyle
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wiley
Published: 2013-10-11T16:00:00+00:00

3 Sport, Politics, and Conflict

The sixth century was an era of profound change in both sport and politics. Trends toward egalitarianism and wider participation in state institutions emerged (Morris 2000: 155–98). Although these trends did not inexorably lead to some form of ­democracy in all parts of Greece, we should acknowledge that developments in political ideology and practices must have impacted athletic ideology. For example, some aristocratic victors emphasized the benefits that accrued to their home city through their ­victories (Kurke 1993). Perhaps paradoxically, some new political trends were facilitated by tyrants, who often appropriated the support of the populace, thus making the people an active agent in the political arena (Hammer 2005). Tyrants are also frequently ­credited with establishing or enlarging local festivals, most notably Peisistratos, who seems to have had a hand in embellishing the Panathenaic festival in Athens (Kyle 1987: 35–6). Overall, by the middle of the fifth century the expanded and more sophisticated world of interstate and local sport operated in an environment of increasing social and political complexity.

In the Classical period (480–323) and subsequent centuries, extant instances of ­criticisms of sport multiply and diversify, in part because of the proliferation of our source material. Whenever the available material allows, we can detect complex and multilayered perceptions of sport. Themes evident in the Archaic period, including complaints about athletes’ inadequate intellectual and military skills, continue to crop up among later critics. Often these themes are combined with physiological and physiognomic arguments, especially among philosophers and medical writers. Equally significantly, political and class considerations often appear to condition negative assessments of sport.

Although not necessarily typical in the Greek world, Athens is a good case in point. By the middle of the fifth century Athens had several festivals with programs that included competitive athletics, and more were added over the course of time (Kyle 1987: 32–53; Osborne 2010: 325–40). Moreover, iconographic and literary sources document activities in Athenian gymnasia and palaistrai. (See Chapter 19 for definitions of these terms.) Such evidence suggests that in ancient Athens, especially after the middle of the sixth century, participating in and watching sport was a widespread, socially accepted activity, and that athletes enjoyed a significant degree of popularity and social visibility.

Like the Archaic critics, most Athenian detractors of sport from the Classical period are selectively critical. For the most part they attack particular athletic practices, habits of athletes, and the ways in which the community perceived and honored athletic victory. Euripides, in his Autolykos (Fragment 282 Nauck), echoes Xenophanes in deriding the custom of rewarding athletes lavishly while neglecting wise and moderate men who are useful to their cities (Marcovich 1977; Iannucci 1998; see Miller 2004: no. 230 for a translation). In the same fragment, Euripides also scorns athletes as unfit for the military defense of the city, echoing a complaint we have already encountered in the work of Tyrtaeus. Socrates, in Plato’s Apology (36d–7a; see Miller 2004: no. 231 for a ­translation), claims that he is more deserving of free meals at public expense than any equestrian Olympic champion.

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