The Olympic Flame

The Olympic Flame

During the Olympic games in 1928 the Olympic Flame was reintroduced. Electric Utility of amsterdam was the first one to light the Flame in the marathon tower Olympic stadium Amsterdam. Most of the time the Flame was is carried by runners, in many transported ways. Fire travelled by boat in 1948 across the English Channel, carried by rowers to canberra, by dragon boat to Hong Kong in 2008 and then by airplane in 1952 when the fire travelled to Helsinki.

(pictured above- the marathon tower in amsterdam)

( pictured above- the olympic ceremony)

( pictured right- olympic flame in berlin 1938

The Symbolism of the Olympic Rings!!!!

OLYMPIC RINGS

According to most accounts, the rings were adopted by Baron Pierre de Coubertin (founder of the modern Olympic Movement) in 1913 after he saw a similar design on an artifact from ancient Greece.





The five rings represent the five major regions of the world: Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Oceania. Every national flag in the world includes at least one of the five colors, which are (from left to right) blue, yellow, black, green, and red. It is important to emphasize that Pierre de Coubertin never said and never wrote that the colors of the rings were linked with the different continents .






The Olympic Flag made its debut at the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp, Belgium. At the end of each Olympic Games, the mayor of that host-city presents the flag to the mayor of the next host-city. It then rests at the town hall of the next host-city for four years until the Opening Ceremony of their Olympic Games.

The Olympic Motto

The Olympic Motto

The Olympic Motto is

• ''Citius, Altius, Fortius'' () ''Swifter, Higher, Stronger.''


• Baron De Coubertin borrowed the motto from the headmaster of Acrueil College in Paris, Father Henri Martin Dideon himself.


• Father Dideon had used the motto to describe the great and magnificent achievements of atheletes at his school.


• Coubertin felt it could be used to decribe and make people near and far realise and discover the goals and fantastic athletes all over the world.

The Begining of Modern Olympics and Who started them again.

The Modern Olympics started again in 1896, by Pierre Fredy Baron De Coubertin. (pictured Left)

Coubertin was a french man who believed that the games could be revived as the whole world was competing in these events.

Not only did Coubertin believe the games could be restarted but Greek man Dimitrios Vikelas the first president of the International Olympic Committee also saw that the world had worked together to make the games come alive once again.

The two men agreed that this event would happen every 4 years other knows as an olympiad. But during World War 1 and 2 games were never held. Such modern day Sports like, Basket ball, Boxing, Cycling, Fencing, Gymnastics, Rowing, Shooting, Soccer, Swimming just to name a few were introduced to the nature of the games.

Mr Vikelas decided that in 1896 the first of the modern Olympic games would be held in Athens, Greece to remind people where the Olympics first started. They also recuited 14 members of the internation committee to supervise all Olympic workings for each games.

Coubertin used the idea of art and culture to modernise the Olympics, introducing painting, literature, architecture and music competitions from 1912 til 1948. Today these things have been changed to express the culture and region as well as the city of the Country holding the games.

The ones who competed in these games were rewarded with Olive wrethes for winning and silver medals, while runner-up recieved a bronze medal and a Laurel Wrethe. Gold, Silver and Bronze medals were not awarded to athletes til early 1900's.

Websites used in this blog.

http://multimedia.olympic.org/pdf/en_report_668.pdf
http://library.thinkquest.org/04oct/00294/historydone.htm
http://www.east-buc.k12.ia.us/00_01/Sp/oly/oly.htm

history of ancient olympics

http://www.hickoksports.com/history/olancien.shtml



Although the ancient olympics games werent originated until 776 BC, they begun at least one century before that and perhaps as early as the 13th century.

One Greek myth once said that the proficient Herakles(Hercules in roman form) achieved a race at Olympia, a very pure in the small state of Elis, and that the race that Herakles raced should be re-enacted once every four years. Another said that the mighty Zeus himself had originated the festival after beating Cronus for the sovereignty of heaven.

The more more believable story is that the olympic festival was a local and religious event until 884 BC, when Iphitus, the king of Elis, decided to turn it into a broader, pan-Hellenic festival. The Greeks based their chronology on a four-year period called an Olympiad, and the grand olympic festival is a sign which means that its the start of a new olympiad. Evidently, the festival was reorganized in 776 BC, which was considered the start of the first Olympiad.

The festival was really only a religious accumulation to celebrate the gods worshipped in general by all Hellenes, primarily Zeus. There were actually another three other major pan-Hellenic festivals, the Pythian, the Nemean, and the Isthmian, all of which included fairs, but the festival at Olympia had become pre-eminent by 572 BC, when Elis and Sparta had entered into an alliance under which Elis was put in charge of the event itself while Sparta enforced the sacred truce.

A single foot race was the only event available until the fifteenth olympiad. the race was approx. 200 yards long which was the length of the stadium.As the time went on the games had been associated with the festival therefore it got important. A 2 stadium length race was added in 724 and a 24 stadium length long-distant race (2.5 miles) was added in 720.

Different types of sports followed quickly: the Pentathlon and Wrestling in 708, Boxing in 688, Chariot Racing in 680, and the Pancratium, a combination of Boxing and Wrestling, in 748. there were 23 olympic sport events from time to time, except they werent ever held at the same carnival.

An Olympic winner won only an official prize which was a bunch of wild olives, but usually there were sometimes unofficial prizes rewarded by his city state. Winners from Other city-states are exempted from taxes for an Olympiad, and in some cases citizens contributed to a cash award.

Atheletes had to arrive in Elis 1 month before the games to undergo spiritual, moral, and physical training under the supervision of the judges, who then had to choose wisely who was qualified to compete in the games. Each competitorhad to swear an oath that he was a free-born Greek who had committed no sacrilege against the gods.

Athletes normally competed in the nude. the competitors originally wore shorts but according to one ancient writer, Pausanias, a competitor has lost his shorts on purpose so that he could run in the race more freely in 720BC, and clothing was then abolished.

Women were not allowed to see the games, but that had absolutely nothing to do with the nudity of the male athletes. It was because Olympia was dedicated to Zeus and was therefore a sacred area for men. The chariot races, which were held outside the sacred precinct, were open to women spectators. (Women had their own sacred festivals from which men were banned, most notably the Heraean festival at Argos, which included a javelin throwing competition.