2010 Vancouver Games and Olympic Truce for Peace
Before Nobel Prize, Olympic Truce Was Internt'l Peace Symbol
Oct 10, 2009
The Olympics are a bi-annual celebration of sportsmanship and international cooperation. There's another aspect to the Games: a temporary peace between warring parties. It is called the Olympic Truce.
The Nobel Peace Prize began in 1901. The Olympic Truce is 20 centuries old. Both institutions suggest that peace, while elusive, is worthy of mankind's highest aspirations. Both are useful in teaching students about history and ethics, and are also tools for peace activists.
The Olympic Truce was an integral part of the Olympic Games for centuries. It is even mentioned by the Greek historian Thucydides. Observed for at least a thousand years, it began as long ago as the 8th or 9th century BC.
Observance of the Olympic Truce faded along with the Games shortly after Rome adopted Christianity. The Olympic Games were not resurrected until the late 19th century, and therefore the Olympic Truce was forgotten, except as a subject of study by scholars of ancient Greece, for about 1,300 years.
The Olympic Truce was known in Greek as Olympiake Ekecheiria. The Greek word ekecheiria means literally, “holding of hands” but also “the truce of God,” and more recently, “suspension of military hostilities."
20 Centuries before Nobel Prize, Greece's Warring City States Brokered “Olympic Truce”
The ancient Olympics were quite different from the sporting competition and television advertising bonanza of today. Contemporary participants and fans think of them as “games,” but the ancient Olympics was a religious festival, one of Greek civilization’s most sacred.
The Olympics were the first of four major pan-Hellenic athletic festivals, held, in accordance with the Greek lunar calendar, once every four years at Olympia in Elis in western Greece. Celebrated in honor of Zeus, the ancient Olympic festival was attended by statesmen, artists, poets, orators, writers and even princes, as well as athletes.
Judith Swaddling, an expert in Greek and Roman Antiquities at the British Museum, imagines the Games in her book, "The Ancient Olympic Games," published by University of Texas Press. She writes, "There is no modern parallel for Olympia; it would have to be a site combining a sports complex and a centre for religious devotion, something like a combination of Wembley Stadium and Westminster Abbey."
Those making the pilgrimage risked getting caught in the nearly constant warfare that characterized the ancient Greek world. Disputes among communities on the Greek mainland, disruptions caused by migrations and, in later centuries, competition among rival power centers within the greater Hellenic world, all imperiled athletes and others embarking on the long trek to Olympia.
How the Olympic Truce Began
As a practical response to the problems caused by this incessant warfare for would-be Olympic travelers, the tradition of the Olympic Truce was begun.
However, the precise origins of the Olympic Truce remain a subject of scholarly debate. One story holds that the truce was the invention of kings of three city-states, Iphitos of Elis (where the Olympic ceremonies were held), Cleosthenes of Pisa, and Lycurgus of Sparta who signed the first Olympic Truce. Their original truce called for a suspension of hostilities for a period of time before, during and after the Games, apparently to enable safe passage of athletes and spectators to Elis, and also to ensure peace in the area where the Games were being observed.
The terms of the original truce were inscribed on a bronze discus kept in the Temple of Hera, adjacent to the Olympic stadium. It said that all those who participated in the Games were forbidden to go to war, carry on a dispute in the court of law or execute criminals during the Games.
The Olympic Games were attended in the early years by hundreds of people, growing to thousands at their peak in the 3rd and 4th century AD when pilgrims came by land and sea from Greek outposts and colonies as far away as Spain and Africa. The Truce ensured their safety during the arduous trip. In antiquity there were steep fines associated with violation of the Olympic Truce
Two Concepts: “Safe Passage” and Peace among Warring Groups.
Over time, the Olympic Truce has come to be associated with two distinct concepts. One is “safe passage” of individual athletes and others participating in the Games. The other is a broader, more expansive idea of the cessation of fighting during the period of the Games. These two concepts, apparent in the ancient Games, still resonate today. The Olympic Truce has been invoked repeatedly in modern times.
How Many Days Did the Ancient Truce Last?
There's no question that the Olympic Truce existed, and also no agreement on how long it lasted. Scholarly opinion ranges from saying the Truce barely existed at all except for athletes, to those who say it applied for a week, or 16 days, or even several months, all before, during and after the actual competitions.
While some of the details of the original Olympic Truce may be lost in the fog of history, the basic concept is not. Peace, elusive, fragile and precious, requires international cooperation, leadership, and high ideals. Perhaps the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Games will be a moment for invocation, once again, of the Olympic Truce.
Sources:
"The Ancient Olympic Games" by Judith Swaddling, University of Texas Press.
"Diplomacy of an Olympic Truce" by Fékrou Kidane, 1999 Sport and Politics
"16 Days: The role of the Olympic Truce in the toolkit for peace" International Olympic Truce Centre, Athens.
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