Contents (Sections):
Pindar
Kallipateira and Kyniska
The Odes
The Panhellenic Games
The Olympian Games
The Pythian Games
The Nemean Games
The Isthmian Games
The Cyrenaic Odes
Pythian 5
Pythian 9
Atalanta



Pindar

Pindar of Thebes (518-438 bce) wrote victory ("epinician") odes celebrating victors in panhellenic athletic contests--Olympian, Pythian, Nemean and Isthmian Games.

"Epinician" is from the Greek meaning "upon the occasion of" (epi) a "victory" (nikÍ).

Pindar would receive a commission either from the victor himself or from his family to compose a celebratory ode to be performed either at the hometown of the victor (after he returned from the Games), at the site of the Games, or occasionally at another location.

Pindar's epinician odes express an affinity with traditional aristocratic values. Many of his odes celebrate the excellence (aretÍ) of victors that results from their combination of hard work, native ability (phya, inherited through the patriline), and divine support.

Pindar wrote 45 odes, the first in 498 (Pythian 12), the last in 446 (Pythian 8). Thus, he was active principally during the first half of the fifth century bce. Fifteen of Pindar's odes were for Sicilian victors, often wealthy tyrants (Hieron of Syracuse, Theros of Akragas).

Sicily had been hellenized beginning in 750 bce, when Ionian colonists from Chalcis in Euboea founded Naxos.

("Ionian" means those Greeks who spoke an Ionic dialect of ancient Greek, such as Athenians. The other two major dialectical and cultural group of ancient Greece were "Doric," to which Sparta belonged, and "Aeolic", the dialect in which Sappho's poems were written.)

Sicily's Dorian colonies like Syracuse (colonized from Corinth) and Akragas became the most powerful city-states on the island.

Five epinicians were for Pindar's native Thebans and eleven were for victors from the island of Aegina, perhaps because there was a special relationship between Thebes and Aegina based on the common descent of their tutelary nymphs: Aegina and Theba were both daughters of the Boeotian river god Asopus.

Pindar wrote three odes for Cyrenean victors, and these are the ones we read in this course. Cyrene was founded in 630 bce as a colony of the Dorian Greek island town Thera. The leader and first king of Cyrene was Aristoteles, called Battus (a Libyan royal title), and his descendants ruled the polis until 440 bce, when Cyrene was reorganized as a democracy. Pindar's Cyrenean epinicians celebrated the last of these descendants, Arkesilas IV.

Epinician odes were a source of pride both for athletes and their cities. Olympian 7, for example, was reportedly inscribed on a marble tablets set up in the temple of Athena in Lindos on Rhodes. This ode, the only one for a Rhodian athlete, was written for the boxer Diagoras, whose family belonged to the noble, ruling class on Rhodes.

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Kallipateira and Kyniska

The family of Diagoras is of interest to us for other reasons as well. Diagoras' three sons and two grandsons were all panhellenic and Olympic victors. His daughter Kallipateira was famous for having violated the rule against married women at the Olympics on certain days:
As you go from Skillous along the road to Olympia, before you cross the Alpheios,there is a mountain with high, precipitous cliffs. It is called Mount Typaion. It is a law of Elis to cast down it any women who are caught present at the Olympic games, or even on the other side of the Alpheios, on the days prohibited to women. However, they say that no woman has been caught, except Kallipateira only...She, being a widow, disguised herself exactly like a gymnastic trainer, and brought her son to compete at Olympia. Peisirodus, for so her son was called, was victorious, and Kallipateira, as she was jumping over the enclosure in which they keep the trainers shut up, bared her person. So her sex was discovered, but they let her go unpunished out of respect for her father, her brothers and her son, all of whom had been victorious at Olympia. But a law was passed that for the future trainers should strip before entering the arena. (Pausanias V.6.7-8)

Unmarried girls were not prohibited from attending the Olympics, and the priestess of Demeter Chamyne had preferential seating at the games. And like men, women might enter their horses in chariot races. The first to do so was the Spartan princesss Kyniska, who won victories in 396 and 392 bce:
Archidamus [king of Sparta] had also a daughter, whose name was Kyniska; she was exceedingly ambitious to succeed at the Olympic games, and was the first woman to breed horses and the first to win an Olympic victory. After Kyniska other women, especially women of Lacedaemon, have won Olympic victories, but none of them was more distinguished for their victories than she (Pausanias III.8.1).

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The Odes

Pindar's poems regularly contain features of the epinician genre--(1) victor praise (often including a victory list), (2) moral maxims, (3) a myth or mythic exemplum, (4) praise of the gods, and (5) a prayer for the victor's future success.

The myth in a given ode may be relevant to the victor, his family and his hometown in a variety of ways. It may include an account of the foundation of the hometown and of exploits of the victor's ancestors. It often provides parallels to the victor's attainments, setting his contemporary triumph within a paradigm of timeless heroism. Sometimes the myth recounts a disaster which a heroic figure did not avoid but which now can serve as a lesson to Pindar's contemporary audience.

In general, as the poet praises the victor whom he was commissioned to celebrate, he also interprets the victory in light of timeless values.

It is possible that shorter, less elaborate odes were performed soon after the victory but that for the lengthier ones Pindar took some time both composing the ode and training a chorus to perform it in song and dance before a hometown audience.

We know very little about the performance of these choral odes, but we do have the meter and references within many of the odes to the circumstances of performance.

Metrically, the odes are divided into either a series of strophes on the same plan or a series of triads, each consisting of a strophe, antistrophe and an epode. The word "strophe" means "turning," and so the antistrophe is the "counter-turn." These words allude to the dancing that accompanied the music. The epode is the part "sung after" [the strophe and antistophe].

Link here to listen to the first strophe, antistrophe and epode of Pythian 1, which alludes to a myth with which you are already familiar from your reading of Hesiod's Theogony. As you listen, notice that the strophe and antistrophe mirror each other exactly in musical rhythm, but that the epode is composed differently.

All of Pindar's epinicians have survived. He also wrote hymns, paeans, dithyrambs, processional songs, maiden songs (partheneia, like those of Alcman) and dirges. These survive in fragmentary form.

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The Panhellenic Games

The panhellenic games were open to all Greeks, as the name implies. They were all The panhellenic festivals were celebrated in a cycle, so that the games at Olympia were held every fourth year, those at Delphi (the Pythian games) every three years, those at Nemea every one or three years, and those at Isthmia (in the territory of Corinth) every two or four years.

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The Olympian Games

The Olympian Games were founded at Olympia in 776 bce in honor of Olympian Zeus.

Olympia was not a city proper, but rather a huge sanctuary where the games were held and which was open only for the duration of these games.

The sanctuary of Olympia included temples, treasuries, a bouleuterion (council hall), stadium, hippodrome, baths, swimming-pool, dwellings for priests and officials, accommodations for pilgrims and athletes, and oracles, along with thousands of altars, statues, decrees and votives within the sacred precinct. The most important monuments at Olympia were:
Link here to see a reconstruction of the altis at Olympia. (Altis was the name given to the area in Olympia that comprises the main religious buildings, temples and votive offerings of the sanctuary.)

Among the important monuments discovered at Olympia and on view at the Olympia Museum are:
Link here for a QuickTime virtual tour of the monuments of Olympia (1:56 min).

There were two principal Foundation Myths for Olympia:

The fourteen Olympian victories that Pindar celebrated ranged from chariot and horse racing and mule car racing to boys' wrestling and boxing and foot racing.

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The Pythian Games

The Pythian Games were founded at Delphi in 582 bce in honor of Apollo of Delphi. Delphi was a small village in Phocis which owed its importance to the fact that it was the seat of a famous temple of Apollo, where people from all places would come to consult an oracle that was at all times in ancient Greece the most respected and influenctial of all prophetic centers. The sanctuary of Apollo was situated on the southern slopes of Mount Parnassos.

The panhellenic games held at Delphi were called the Pythian Games, and were instituted to celebrate Apollo's victory over the monster Python.

The Pythian Games were originally an artistic, rather than an athletic celebration. Contests included singing, lyre playing, flute playing, and dramatic performances.

After the First Sacred War (600-586 bce), Delphi was liberated from the control of the city-state of Krisa by the Amphyctionic League. The Amphyctions then reorganized the festival and added athletic contests to the program of the festival. These games were the same as at Olympia, with the exception of the four-horse chariot race and the boys' competitions. As at Olympia, victors were not given monetary prizes. At Delphi they were given a wreath of laurel or bay leaves.

The sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi included temples, treasuries, a bouleuterion (council hall), stadium, gymnasium, theater, fountainhouse, and thousands of dedications and statues. Among the most important monuments at Delphi were:
Link here to see a reconstruction of the Temenos of Apollo at Delphi.

Among the important monuments discovered at Delphi and on view at the Delphi Museum are:
Link here for QuickTime virtual tour of the site, which includes a nice overview of the striking setting, as well as famous monuments on display in the museum at Delphi.

The sanctuary was originally called Pytho and dedicated to chthonian gods, especially Gaia. Its tutelary demon then was the snake Python. Apollo slew Python, established his own sanctuary on the spot, buried Python under the Omphalos, and established in his honor the Pythian games. The myth is related in the Homeric Hymn to Apollo and recapitulaed in the opening lines of Aeschylus' Eumenides.

Pindar's twelve Pythian odes celebrated six chariot race victories, as well as the single horse race, wrestling, the race in armor, boys' foot races and one flute competition.

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The Nemean Games

The Nemean Games were held in honor of Zeus in the city of Nemea. The site of Ancient Nemea lies in an upland valley of the Argolid, in the eastern foothills of the Arkadian mountains.

The Nemean Games were first held in 573 bce. They were similar to the Olympic and Pythian games. Besides athletic contests, music and equestrian ones were added with the passing of time. The arbiters or judges were always dressed in black, in order to honor the memory of Opheltos, in whose honor the games were established. Winners were awarded crowns of celery.

The sanctuary of Zeus at Nemea included temples, altars, pavilions, a hotel, a bath house, and a hero shrine. The most important monuments were:

Link here to see a reconstruction of the Sanctuary of Zeus at Nemea

Nemea holds a prominent position in Greek mythology as the site of the first labor of Herakles, the slaying of the Nemean lion. The skin of this beast was impenetrable and Herakles was forced to wrestle and strangle the lion. Using the lion's own claws, he removed the skin which he then wore as a coat of armor. It was not until Roman times, however, that a connecton was introduced between the killing of the Nemean Lion by Herakles and the founding of the Nemean Games.

In antiquity the myth of the first Nemean Games was the story of the death of the baby Opheltes, son of Lykourgos and Eurydike. When their son was born, Lykourgos consulted the oracle at Delphi in order to find out how he might insure the health and happiness of his child. The priestess replied that the child must not touch the ground until he had learned to walk. Upon his return to Nemea, Lykourgos assigned a slave woman, Hypsipyle, the task of caring for his child. On that fateful day, the Seven Heroes (Seven against Thebes) passed through Nemea on their way to attack Thebes. When they asked Hypsipyle for something to drink, she placed the baby on a bed of wild celery, where he was killed by a serpent, thus fulfilling the prophecy. The Seven Heroes renamed the baby Archemoros ("Beginner-of-doom"), and held the first Nemean Games in his honor as a funerary festival.

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The Isthmian Games

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The Cyrenaic Odes

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Pythian 5

Pythian 5 commemorates the same victory as Pythian 4, assigned for next time, the victory of Arkesilas of Kyrene in the chariot race of 462.

Kastor and Pollux, known as the Dioskouroi ("children of Zeus"), were hero sons of Zeus worshipped throughout Greece, but especially in Sparta, as saviours and protectors of travellers. They rescued their sister Helen from Theseus; themselves raped the daughters of Leukippos, and joined the expedition of the Argonauts. Kastor was known for horsemanship, Pollux for skill in boxing.

Pytho was the original name for the site of Apollo's temple at Delphi; see, for example, these lines in the Homeric Hymn to Pythian Apollo: "Leto's all-glorious son goes to rocky Pytho, playing upon his hollow lyre, clad in divine, perfumed garments...."

Aphrodite's garden: the worship of Aphrodite in Kyrene was manifested in a "Kyrene-type" of her statuary; the principal example is in the Museo Terme in Rome, but the North Carolina Museum of Art acquired the only other example in 1980.

Karrhotas was the brother-in-law of Arkesilas, his wife's brother, and the charioteer for this race. Pythian 5 is anomalous in celebrating the driver--most chariots were driven by hired drivers, and this commodification of the athletic contest implicated aristocratic patrons in a mode of exchange against which they defined themselves. Karrhotas, by contrast, was not only not a hired driver, but was related to Arkesilas and shared his aristocratic lineage, as indicated by the use of the patronymic in line 45 ("son of Alexibios").

water of Kastalia - Kastalia (described briefly above) was the sacred spring at Delphi, where pilgrims purified themselves before entering the sanctuary. It was sacred to the nymph Kastalia (after whom it was named) who threw herself into its waters to escape the advances of Apollo. Its waters flowed through a gorge separating the twin Phaedriades ("Shining") Mountains to the east of the temenos of Apollo, and then into two fountain-houses: the Hellenistic one and an archaic one.

Krisean Hill - Mount Parnassos; Krisa was the original name of Delphi.

Cypress Chamber - cypress was commonly used for dedications; cf. Pausanias' report on the first dedications at Olympia: "The first athletes to have their statues dedicated at Olympia were Praxidamas of Aegina, victorious at boxing at the fifty-ninth Festival1, and Rexibius the Opuntian, a successful pancratiast at the sixty-first Festival2. These statues stand near the pillar of Oenomaus, and are made of wood, Rexibius of figwood and the Aeginetan of cypress, and his statue is less decayed than the other" (6.18.7).

Kretan bowmen - in the Homeric Hymn to Apollo, the god diverts a Cretan ship to Delphi, and installs the Cretans as his first priests.

loud-roaring lions

Aigimios was a legendary king of the Dorians, whom Herakles aided when they were attacked by the Lapiths; Herakles subsequently settled these Dorians in Doris. Aigimios' two sons were the eponymous heroes of two of the Dorians' three tribes.

Apollo Karneios ("horned"), perhaps indicating his manifestation as a herdsmen's god. There was a 6th-century sanctuary of Apollo Karneios on Thera, whence the settlers of Kyrene came, and the coinage of Cyrene depicts Apollo Karneios, the chief deity of Kyrene after Zeus Ammon.

Antenor's sons - according to some sources, including Pindar in this ode, Antenor, the husband of the Trojan priestess Theano, embarked after the defeat of Troy with Menelaus and Helen, was carried to Libya, and settled at Cyrene.

The ode concludes with two prayers. One was granted: Arkesilas went on to win the chariot race at Olympia in 460 bce. But the prosperity Pindar hopes will continue came to an end not long after Arkesilas' Olympian triumph: he lost his life in a popular uprising, and his dynasty died with him.

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Pythian 9

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Atalanta

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Lycurgus had sons, Ancaeus, Epochus, Amphidamas, and Iasus,by Cleophyle or Eurynome. And Amphidamas had a son Melanion and a daughter Antimache, whom Eurystheus married. And Iasus had a daughter Atalanta by Clymene, daughter of Minyas. This Atalanta was exposed by her father, because he desired male children; and a she-bear came often and gave her suck, till hunters found her and brought her up among themselves. Grown to womanhood, Atalanta kept herself a virgin, and hunting in the wilderness she remained always under arms. The centaurs Rhoecus and Hylaeus tried to force her, but were shot down and killed by her. She went moreover with the chiefs to hunt the Calydonian boar, and at the games held in honor of Pelias she wrestled with Peleus and won. Afterwards she discovered her parents, but when her fatherwould have persuaded her to wed, she went away to a place that might serve as a racecourse, and, having planted a stake three cubits high in the middle of it, she caused her wooers to race before her from there, and ran herself in arms; and if the wooer was caught up, his due was death on the spot, and if he was not caught up, his due was marriage. When many had already perished, Melanion came to run for love of her, bringing golden apples from Aphrodite, and being pursued he threw them down, and she, picking up the dropped fruit, was beaten in the race. So Melanion married her (Apollodorus 3.9.2).

(The victor in this footrace is sometimes identified as Hippomenes, rather than Melanion.)

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