Juegos Olimpicos

The olympics games.

The ancient Olympic Games (named place in the city of Olympia) were religious festivals, cultural and sports held in ancient Greece (776 a. C. - 392 AD.) In honor of the Olympian gods. Athletes participating in them, they should be citizens and men, and who trained for years in gyms. There are many legends about the origin of the ancient Olympic Games. One associates the first Games with the concept of ancient Greece ἐκεχειρία (ekecheiria) or Olympic truce or peace. One of the most popular myths identifies Heracles and Zeus, father of the progenitors of the Games. According to a legend mentioned by Pindar, Heracles who was called "Olympics" to a series of sporting events in honor of his father Zeus and the custom of celebrating four years in addition to the idea persists that after completing his twelve labors, built the Olympic stadium in honor of Zeus. After its completion, he went straight 200 steps and called this "distance Stadion" (Greek: στάδιον, Latin: stadium, "stage"), which later became a unit of distance. The date of commencement of such calendar serves as a reference to Hellenic and is considered in the year 776. C., although the views of some scholars place it among the year 884 a. C. and 704 a. C. Since then, the Games quickly took a larger role in ancient Greece, reaching its zenith in the sixth century and centuries to V century. C. The Olympics had a fundamentally religious significance, when the Greek city-state went to war and came the time of the Olympic Games, the war was suspended to make way for the games by his deep religious and cultural value. With contests alternating with sacrifices and ceremonies in honor of Zeus (whose statue stood majestically in Olympia) and Pelops, divine hero and mythical king of Olympia famous for his legendary chariot race and in whose honor they were held. The number of events increased to twenty, and the celebrations continued for several days. The first competitions were based on foot races, and later were introduced the fight, the pentathlon, testing of various events including javelin, discus and long jump, the pankration, chariot races, and several artistic skills such as music, poetry and dance. The Olympic flame was kept on the altar of Zeus during the ancient games. Today, light a torch by the action of the sun's rays in Olympia, and then transported to the headquarters of the Olympic Games. In Olympia came to celebrate 293 Olympic Games, until the Christian emperor Theodosius I abolished them consider the year 393 by pagan.

...