Les jeux olympiques d'Antioche

Abstract

The Olympic Games at Antioche. Many cities created Olympic Games in imitation of those at Pisè. Thanks to Libanios and Malalas, we are fairly well informed about the O. G at Antioche. Created under Augustus, they were to be celebrated as far down as the 6th centuiy A.D. In the fourth centuiy they still preserved their religious character. Sporting events went along with other forms of entertainment that took place in the amphitheatre, the hippodrome or the theatre. The athletic contests took place in Antioche itself, in the xystos and the plethrion, and at Daphnê, in the stadium. The great curial families assumed in turn the organisation and financing, in conformity with the system of the leiturgeia. Libanios the sophist objected to the initiatives tending to increase the number of seats in the plethrion. His argument rests wholly on the fact that the plethrion was the place for the preliminary heats which only a very small number of people should attend, in order to preserve the religious character of this preliminary phase of the games and to shield the umpire from popular pressure. The sophist intended to safeguard the ancient Hellenic tradition against the majority of his fellow-citizens who looked upon the games mainly as an occasion to provide the crowds, Roman-wise, with spectacular entertainments.