I took in the awesome natural beauty of the setting, an alluvial plain dotted with poplars, oaks, and olive trees, with pine-covered hills in the distance. Looming just behind Olympia was Mount Kronos, not a particularly high peak but imposing because it stood alone, and famous because of its history; on its summit Zeus wrestled his father, the king of the Titans, for control of the universe. In the valley below, Apollo once took on Ares in a boxing match, and emerged victorious. Off to the east, where the stadium now stood, Apollo defeated Hermes in a footrace. Hercules himself paced out the running track for them-and there it was, freshly groomed and ready to be used by this year’s contestants, covered with raked white sand that sparkled under the bright sun.
At the heart of the complex was the famed Altis, the Sacred Grove of Zeus. Enclosed by a wall, the Altis still contained a number of trees-including the fabled olive tree planted by Hercules, from which the winners’ wreaths would be harvested-but where once a wild forest grew, there now stood a host of temples, shrines, civic monuments, and colonnades, erected over the centuries. The Altis also contained thousands of statues, some of gods, but many more depicting nude athletes, for every winner of an Olympic event was entitled to be immortalized in bronze. Dominating all else was the massive Temple of Zeus with its soaring columns and a roof made of marble tiles. The frieze that ran all the way around the temple, below the roof and above the columns, was decorated with gilded shields that glittered under the afternoon sun.
Outside the Altis were a great many buildings of practical purpose, including assembly halls, barracks for athletes, and an opulent lodge where only the most important visitors to the Games would be housed.
Thronging the entire site, filling the valley and spilling onto the hillsides, were tens of thousands of visitors. I had never seen so many people in one place.
We descended into the valley and were swallowed by the festive crowd. My eyes and ears were given no rest. Here was a juggler, and there a poet with a lyre reciting verses. A hawker announced the upcoming program of recitations, musical performances, and philosophical debates. A herald called for family members of contestants to register for a limited number of reserved places in the stadium. A buxom fortune-teller at a makeshift stall loudly proclaimed to a doddering graybeard that he would live to be one hundred, then took the fellow’s money, pushed him aside, and called for the next customer.
Men rushed this way and that, or stood in groups, talking, eating, and laughing. A religious procession passed by, headed by a priestess in a trailing white gown followed by little boys carrying trays of burning incense. The sweet smoke mingled with the scent of freshly baked flatbread from a nearby food vendor, and then with a confusion of perfumes as a party of visiting dignitaries-Egyptians, to judge by their nemes headdresses-passed in the opposite direction, carried on gilded litters.
We found ourselves in a vast marketplace where vendors hawked an amazing variety of charms, amulets, and souvenirs. There were tiny images of athletes-runners, wrestlers, boxers, javelin throwers, charioteers-as well as miniature replicas of Phidias’s statue of Zeus, executed in painted wood, metal, and even glass.
While Antipater examined a small statue of the famous Discus Thrower by Myron, I was distracted by a pair of beautiful women who sauntered by, laughing and whispering to each other. One was blond and the other brunette and both were as tall as Amazons. Their chitons were so flimsy it seemed the merest breeze might blow them away. Married women were not allowed in Olympia, but other sorts of women were. The blond saw me looking at her and nudged her companion. They both gave me sultry smiles, making it clear their company was for sale-and far beyond my means.
It seemed that the entire world had contracted to a single, swirling vortex, and I stood in the very center of it.
That was when Antipater saw the look on my face and asked if I had ever seen or even imagined such a spectacle-the crowded, chaotic festivity of Olympia on the eve of the Games-and I could only shake my head in wonder, admitting by my silence that I had not.
Continuing to make our way through the throng, we came to a group of spectators who stood in a compact circle. From their bursts of laughter I assumed quite a funny mime show was being performed-or perhaps not, for the laughter had a derisive edge to it and was peppered with catcalls and scoffing noises. Some of the spectators turned away and stalked off, shaking their heads and making faces. Antipater and I slipped into their spots to see what the fuss was about.
The tall man who was holding the crowd’s attention was barefoot and dressed in beggar’s rags, with long, scraggly hair and a beard that might have concealed a bird’s nest or two. His naked limbs were long and spindly. His skin, dark and leathery from long exposure to the sun, made his blue eyes all the more startling, especially since he maintained a wide-eyed stare that showed circles of white all around.
“Fools!” he shouted, shaking a gnarled walking stick in his equally gnarled fist. “You say you come here to honor Zeus, but all you honor is your own appetites. Those you truly worship are not the gods, but the athletes who compete for your amusement-the stupidest and most worthless among you!”
“If the Games are so stupid, what are you doing here, you old fool?” someone shouted back at him.
“Just as a good doctor rushes to help in places full of the sick or wounded, so the wise man must go where idiots gather,” declared the beggar.
“Ugh!” exclaimed Antipater. “The man is a Cynic, here to spoil everyone’s enjoyment.”
“Ah! So that’s what a Cynic looks like.” I had heard of these itinerant philosophers, who cared nothing for personal comfort (or hygiene) and went about loudly disparaging all the things that gave their fellow mortals pleasure. According to Antipater, Cynics were common in the Greek-speaking world, but I had never seen one in Rome, where it was hard to imagine that such antisocial gadflies would ever be tolerated.
A man in a green chiton spoke up. “How dare you come here, to the most sacred of all the Games, and speak against the athletes? What gives more pleasure to the gods than beauty, and what could be more beautiful than the sight of young men running in competition? I put it to you that running is the most noble of mortal pursuits.”
“What you’re really saying is that you get a thrill from watching all those naked, straining backsides,” said the Cynic. The crowd laughed and the object of his derision blushed bright red. “What’s so noble about running, anyway? The rabbit and the antelope are the fastest of creatures-and the most timid! Do you think Zeus gives a whit which coward can flee the fastest?”
This elicited more jeering. In Rome, the crowd would have pelted the fellow with bits of food, or even with stones. But though they sneered and shook their heads, no one raised a hand against the Cynic or made any effort to silence him. Just as the Greeks worship athletes, they also respect the free speech of philosophers-even Cynics.
I turned to Antipater and lowered my voice. “The fellow does have a point.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, what is all this fuss about who can run the fastest, or throw a stick the farthest, or keep on throwing punches after his head’s a bloody pulp? The idea that all these tens of thousands of people should travel hundreds of miles just to watch some athletic competitions-it’s all a bit silly, isn’t it?”
Antipater looked at me as if I had uttered a shocking blasphemy. “I suggest you keep those thoughts to yourself, Gordianus. A Cynic can get away with saying such things, but a visitor from Rome is expected to show more respect.”