| The first ancient
Olympic Games can be traced back to 776 BC. They were dedicated to the Olympian
gods and were staged on the ancient plains of Olympia.
Through the 12
centuries of the Olympic Games, many wonderful athletes competed in the stadium
and the hippodrome of ancient Olympia's sacred area, moving the crowds with
their great achievements.
The ancient Olympic
Games were initially a one-day event until 684 BC, when they were extended
to three days. In the 5th century B.C., the Games were extended again to cover
five days.
The famous marathon
race did not exist in the ancient Games. The starting pistol of the first
Olympic marathon was fired on 14 April 1896 at 2 p.m.
Although the ancient
Games were staged in Olympia, Greece, from 776 BC through 393 AD, it took
1503 years for the Olympics to return. The first modern Olympics were held
in Athens, Greece, in 1896.
The idea of the
Olympic torch or Olympic Flame was first inaugurated in the 1928 Olympic Games
in Amsterdam. There was no torch relay in the ancient Olympic Games. There
were known, however, torch relays in other ancient Greek athletic festivals
including those held at Athens. The modern Olympic torch relay was first instituted
at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin.
The ancient olympics
had a rich variety of games (or contests, as they were called by the Ancient
Greeks). Many of these games are the ancestors of our modern olympic games
and had rules and playing conditions modern athletes would not be unfamiliar
with.
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