BLACKWELL COMPANIONS TO THE ANCIENT WORLDBLACKWELL

COMPANIONS TO THE ANCIENT

WORLD

sport and Spectacle in greek and

roman antiquity

A C O M P A N I O N T O

EDITED BY Paul Christesen and donald G. kyle

A C O M P A N I O N T O

sport and Spectacle in greek and

roman antiquity

E D I T E D B Y p a u l c h r i s t e s e n

a n d d o n a l d g . k y l e

A Companion to Sport and Spectacle in Greek and Roman Antiquity presents a series of original essays that apply a sociohistorical perspective to myriad aspects of ancient sport and spectacle. Featuring contributions from a wide range of international scholars in various disciplines, readings focus on the status and roles of participants, organizers, and spectators while addressing such themes as class, gender, ethnicity, religion, violence, and more. Introductory essays on the historiography of Greek and Roman sport are followed by specialized readings relating to Greek sports in specific locales such as Athens and Sparta. Subsequent readings relating to the Roman Empire focus on sport and spectacle in the city of Rome and in various Roman cities and provinces. Distinctions between “sport” and “spectacle” are examined and understanding sport and spectacle as part of a broader social canvas, rather than isolated activities, is emphasized. Offering a wealth of new insights, A Companion to Sport and Spectacle in Greek and Roman Antiquity represents an invaluable scholarly contribution to ancient sport studies.

t h e e d i t o r sPaul Christesen is Professor of Classics at Dartmouth College, USA. He is the author of Sport and Democracy in the Ancient and Modern Worlds (2012), Olympic Victor Lists and Ancient Greek History (2007), and numerous articles and chapters on Greek historiography, ancient Greek history, and ancient sport.

Donald G. Kyle is Professor and former Chair of History at the University of Texas at Arlington, USA. He is the author of Sport and Spectacle in the Ancient World (Wiley-Blackwell, 2007), Spectacles of Death in Ancient Rome (1998), Athletics in Ancient Athens (1987), and numerous articles and chapters on ancient sport history.

A C O M P A N I O N T O

sport and Spectacle in greek androman antiquity

C o n t r i b u t o r s t o t h i s v o l u m e :

Winthrop Lindsay Adams, Gregory S. Aldrete, Carla M. Antonaccio, Sinclair Bell, Giampiero Bevagna, Stephen Brunet, Michael J. Carter,

Paul Christesen, Hazel Dodge, Roger Dunkle, Chris Epplett,Garrett G. Fagan, Donald G. Kyle, Andrew Lear, Hugh M. Lee,

Rose MacLean, Kathryn Mammel, Christian Mann, Stephen G. Miller, Sarah C. Murray, Jenifer Neils, Nigel Nicholson, Thomas Heine Nielsen,

Zinon Papakonstantinou, David Alan Parnell, Timothy P. J. Perry,Werner Petermandl, H. W. Pleket, Sofie Remijsen, David Gilman Romano,

Jeremy Rutter, Michael Scott, Jerry Toner, Zara Martirosova Torlone, Steven L. Tuck, Ingomar Weiler, John Zaleski

A L S O A V A I L A B L E I N T H I S S E R I E S :

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A CompAnion to Sport And SpeCtACle in Greek And romAn Antiquity

BlACkWell CompAnionS to tHe AnCient WorldThis series provides sophisticated and authoritative overviews of periods of ancient history, genres of classical literature, and the most important themes in ancient culture. Each volume comprises between twenty-five and forty concise essays written by individual scholars within their area of specialization. The essays are written in a clear, provocative, and lively manner, designed for an international audience of scholars, students, and general readers.

Ancient HistorypublishedA Companion to the Roman ArmyEdited by Paul Erdkamp

A Companion to the Roman RepublicEdited by Nathan Rosenstein and Robert Morstein-Marx

A Companion to the Roman EmpireEdited by David S. Potter

A Companion to the Classical Greek WorldEdited by Konrad H. Kinzl

A Companion to the Ancient Near EastEdited by Daniel C. Snell

A Companion to the Hellenistic WorldEdited by Andrew Erskine

A Companion to Late AntiquityEdited by Philip Rousseau

A Companion to Ancient HistoryEdited by Andrew Erskine

A Companion to Archaic GreeceEdited by Kurt A. Raaflaub and Hans van Wees

A Companion to Julius CaesarEdited by Miriam Griffin

A Companion to ByzantiumEdited by Liz James

A Companion to Ancient EgyptEdited by Alan B. Lloyd

A Companion to Ancient MacedoniaEdited by Joseph Roisman and Ian Worthington

A Companion to the Punic WarsEdited by Dexter Hoyos

A Companion to AugustineEdited by Mark Vessey

A Companion to Marcus AureliusEdited by Marcel van Ackeren

A Companion to Ancient Greek GovernmentEdited by Hans Beck

A Companion to the Neronian AgeEdited by Emma Buckley and Martin T. Dinter

LiterAture And cuLturepublishedA Companion to Classical ReceptionsEdited by Lorna Hardwick and Christopher Stray

A Companion to Greek and Roman HistoriographyEdited by John Marincola

A Companion to CatullusEdited by Marilyn B. Skinner

A Companion to Roman ReligionEdited by Jörg Rüpke

A Companion to Greek ReligionEdited by Daniel Ogden

A Companion to the Classical TraditionEdited by Craig W. Kallendorf

A Companion to Roman RhetoricEdited by William Dominik and Jon Hall

A Companion to Greek RhetoricEdited by Ian Worthington

A Companion to Ancient EpicEdited by John Miles Foley

A Companion to Greek TragedyEdited by Justina Gregory

A Companion to Latin LiteratureEdited by Stephen Harrison

A Companion to Greek and Roman Political ThoughtEdited by Ryan K. Balot

A Companion to OvidEdited by Peter E. Knox

A Companion to the Ancient Greek LanguageEdited by Egbert Bakker

A Companion to Hellenistic LiteratureEdited by Martine Cuypers and James J. Clauss

A Companion to Vergil’s Aeneid and its TraditionEdited by Joseph Farrell and Michael C. J. Putnam

A Companion to HoraceEdited by Gregson Davis

A Companion to Families in the Greek and Roman WorldsEdited by Beryl Rawson

A Companion to Greek MythologyEdited by Ken Dowden and Niall Livingstone

A Companion to the Latin LanguageEdited by James Clackson

A Companion to TacitusEdited by Victoria Emma Pagán

A Companion to Women in the Ancient WorldEdited by Sharon L. James and Sheila Dillon

A Companion to SophoclesEdited by Kirk Ormand

A Companion to the Archaeology of the Ancient Near EastEdited by Daniel Potts

A Companion to Roman Love ElegyEdited by Barbara K. Gold

A Companion to Greek ArtEdited by Tyler Jo Smith and Dimitris Plantzos

A Companion to Persius and JuvenalEdited by Susanna Braund and Josiah Osgood

A Companion to the Archaeology of the Roman RepublicEdited by Jane DeRose Evans

A Companion to TerenceEdited by Antony Augoustakis and Ariana Traill

A Companion to Roman ArchitectureEdited by Roger B. Ulrich and Caroline K. Quenemoen

A Companion to Sport and Spectacle in Greek and Roman AntiquityEdited by Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

A CompAnion to Sport And SpeCtACle in

Greek And romAn

Antiquity

Edited by

Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

This edition first published 2014© 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

A companion to sport and spectacle in Greek and Roman antiquity / edited by Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle. pages cm. – (Blackwell companions to the ancient world) “A John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., publication.” Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4443-3952-9 (hardback) – ISBN 978-1-118-60996-5 – ISBN 978-1-118-61004-6 – ISBN 978-1-118-61005-3 (ePUB) – ISBN 978-1-118-61013-8 (Mb) – ISBN 978-1-118-61086-2 (ePDF) 1. Sports–Greece–History. 2. Sports–Rome–History. 3. Sports–Social aspects–Greece–History. 4. Sports–Social aspects–Rome–History. 5. Greece–Social life and customs. 6. Rome–Social life and customs. 7. Greece–Social conditions–To 146 B.C. 8. Rome–Social conditions. I. Christesen, Paul, 1966– II. Kyle, Donald G. GV21.C66 2013 796′.0938–dc23

2013029872

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Cover image: Panathenaic prize amphora, ca. 530 bc, attributed to Euphiletos Painter. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1914. (14.130.12). Photo © 2013 The Metropolitan Museum of Art/Art Resource/Scala, Florence.Cover design by Workhaus

Set in 10/12.5pt Galliard by SPi Publisher Services, Pondicherry, India

1 2014

0002020742.INDD 4 9/19/2013 7:06:46 PM

Contents

List of Figures ixList of Maps and Plans xiiiNotes on Contributors xvAcknowledgments xxi

General Introduction 1Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

SeCtion i Greece 17

pArt i the Background 191 Greek Athletic Competitions: The Ancient Olympics

and More 21Donald G. Kyle

2 Sport in the Aegean Bronze Age 36Jeremy Rutter

3 Sport in the Early Iron Age and Homeric Epic 53Timothy P. J. Perry

4 Representations of Sport in Greek Literature 68Nigel Nicholson

5 Picturing Victory: Representations of Sport in Greek Art 81Jenifer Neils

6 Inscriptions as Evidence for Greek Sport 98H. W. Pleket

7 Recent Trends in the Study of Greek Sport 112Ingomar Weiler

vi Contents

pArt ii places 1318 Panhellenic Athletics at Olympia 133

Thomas Heine Nielsen

9 Sport and Society in Sparta 146Paul Christesen

10 Sport, Society, and Politics in Athens 159Donald G. Kyle

11 Athletic Festivals in the Northern Peloponnese and Central Greece 176David Gilman Romano

12 Sport and Society in the Greek West 192Carla M. Antonaccio

pArt iii people, Settings, ideas 20913 Sport and Democratization in Ancient Greece

(with an Excursus on Athletic Nudity) 211Paul Christesen

14 Growing Up with Greek Sport: Education and Athletics 236Werner Petermandl

15 Eros and Greek Sport 246Andrew Lear

16 Greek Female Sport: Rites, Running, and Racing 258Donald G. Kyle

17 People on the Fringes of Greek Sport 276Christian Mann

18 The Greek Stadium as a Reflection of a Changing Society 287Stephen G. Miller

19 The Social Life of Greek Athletic Facilities (other than Stadia) 295Michael Scott

20 The Role of Religion in Greek Sport 309Sarah C. Murray

21 Ancient Critics of Greek Sport 320Zinon Papakonstantinou

22 Sport, Spectacle, and Society in Ancient Macedonia 332Winthrop Lindsay Adams

Contents vii

pArt iV later Greek Sport and Spectacle 34723 Greek Sport in Egypt: Status Symbol and Lifestyle 349

Sofie Remijsen

24 Sport in Hellenistic and Roman Asia Minor 364H. W. Pleket

SeCtion ii rome 377

pArt i the Background 37925 Overview of Roman Spectacle 381

Roger Dunkle

26 Etruscan Sport 395Giampiero Bevagna

27 Writing Arenas: Roman Authors and Their Games 412Zara Martirosova Torlone

28 Representations of Spectacle and Sport in Roman Art 422Steven L. Tuck

29 Material Evidence for Roman Spectacle and Sport 438Gregory S. Aldrete

30 Trends in the Study of Roman Spectacle and Sport 451Jerry Toner

pArt ii Spectacles and Sport in rome 46331 Gladiatorial Combat as Alluring Spectacle 465

Garrett G. Fagan

32 Women with Swords: Female Gladiators in the Roman World 478Stephen Brunet

33 Roman Chariot Racing: Charioteers, Factions, Spectators 492Sinclair Bell

34 Roman Beast Hunts 505Chris Epplett

35 Spectacular Executions in the Roman World 520Chris Epplett

36 Greek Sports in Rome 533Hugh M. Lee

viii Contents

pArt iii people, Settings, ideas 54337 Amphitheaters in the Roman World 545

Hazel Dodge

38 Venues for Spectacle and Sport (other than Amphitheaters) in the Roman World 561Hazel Dodge

39 People on the Margins of Roman Spectacle 578Rose MacLean

40 Religion and Roman Spectacle 590John Zaleski

41 Ancient Critics of Roman Spectacle and Sport 603Kathryn Mammel

pArt iV later roman Spectacle and Sport 61742 Romanization through Spectacle in the Greek East 619

Michael J. Carter

43 Spectacle and Sport in Constantinople in the Sixth Century ce 633David Alan Parnell

Index 646

Figures

1.1 Panathenaic prize amphora showing events from the pentathlon, attributed to the Euphiletos Painter, c.530–520 bce, British Museum 1842, 0314.1, © Trustees of the British Museum 28

2.1 Restored line drawing of the Boxer Rhyton, c.1550–1500 bce, from R. Koehl, Aegean Bronze Age Rhyta, frontispiece, image courtesy of INSTAP Academic Press. Used with permission of R. Koehl 42

3.1 Athenian amphora possibly depicting a chariot race, c.700 bce, British Museum 1936, 1017.1, © Trustees of the British Museum 55

5.1 Athenian krater showing torch race victor, attributed to the Nikias Painter, c.420 bce, British Museum 1898, 0716.6, © Trustees of the British Museum 82

5.2 Athenian cup showing boxers and trainer, attributed to Douris, c.480 bce, British Museum 1867, 0508.1060, © Trustees of the British Museum 85

5.3 Athenian cup showing boxer/pentathlete, attributed to the Epidromos Painter, c.500 bce, Hood Museum of Art C.970.35, Dartmouth College, gift of Mr and Mrs Ray Winfield Smith, Class of 1918 86

5.4 Athenian chous showing two athletes with a younger slave, attributed to the Achilles Painter, c.440 bce, Basel, Antikenmuseum und Sammlung Ludwig BS 485 86

5.5a–b Panathenaic prize amphora showing Athena and wrestling contest, attributed to the Berlin Painter, c.480 bce, Hood Museum of Art C.959.53, Dartmouth College, gift of Mr and Mrs Ray Winfield Smith, Class of 1918 89

5.6a–b Silver stater minted by the city of Aspendos showing wrestlers and youth aiming slingshot, c.350 bce, Hood Museum of Art 990.24.27095, Dartmouth College, Gift of the Class of 1962 90

5.7 Drawing of an athletic victor holding branches and fillets, from an Athenian amphora attributed to Douris, c.480 bce, St. Petersburg Hermitage Museum B.5576, from Compte Rendu de la Commission Impériale Archéologique 1874, pl. 7 91

x Figures

5.8 Marble statue of a boy athlete (the “Westmacott Athlete”), Roman copy of Greek original by Polykleitos of Argos from c.440 bce, British Museum 1857,0807.1, © Trustees of the British Museum 92

5.9 Bronze head of a boxer found at Olympia, c.330–320 bce, Athens National Museum Bronze 6439. Photograph by Sharon Mollerus. Used with permission 93

10.1 Marble relief found in the Athenian Agora showing apobates race, fourth century bce, Agora Museum S399. Photograph by Steven Bach. Used with permission 164

12.1 Family tree of the Deinomenids and Emmenids 19812.2a Bronze statue of a charioteer found at Delphi (the “Delphi Charioteer”),

c.475 bce, Delphi Archaeological Museum Inv. Nos. 3484, 3520, 3540. Photograph by Raminus Falcon. Used with permission 199

12.2b Marble statue of a charioteer found at Motya in Sicily (the “Motya Charioteer”), c.480–450 bce, Museo Joseph Whitaker, Motya, San Pantaleo, Italy. Photograph by Carole King. Used with permission 199

15.1 Athenian skyphos showing a courtship scene, attributed to the Lewis Painter, c.460 bce, Copyright © Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology and the Regents of the University of California Catalog No. 8-4581 251

15.2 Athenian kylix showing courtship scene, attributed to Douris, c.480–470 bce, © 2013 Image copyright The Metropolitan Museum of Art/Art Resource/Scala, Florence 252

16.1 Bronze figurine, possibly made in Sparta, of a female runner or dancer, found at Prizren in Serbia, c.520–500 bce, British Museum 1876.5–10.1 (Bronze 208), © Trustees of the British Museum 265

18.1 View of the Nemea stadium (c.330–320 bce) from the southeast with the starting line and tunnel entrance leading west to the apodyterion. Photograph by Stephen Miller. Used with permission 288

18.2 Drawing of the starting line with toe grooves and reconstructed hysplex mechanism at Nemea, from S. Miller, Excavations at Nemea II: The Early Hellenistic Stadium (2001), fig. 91. Used with permission 289

18.3 The vaulted entrance to the Nemea stadium, c.320 bce, with the track at the far end. Photograph by Stephen Miller. Used with permission 291

18.4 Drawing of a cutaway restoration of the apodyterion at Nemea, from S. Miller, The Ancient Stadium at Nemea: A Self-Guided Tour (1994), p. 7. Used with permission 292

25.1 Reconstruction of the Circus Maximus in Rome, based on B. Fletcher, A History of Architecture on the Comparative Method (1921), p. 105 385

25.2 Mosaic from a Roman villa at Bad Kreuznach, Germany, showing gladiatorial combat between a thraex and murmillo, third century ce. Photograph by Michael Eckrich-Neubauer. Used with permission 387

26.1 Wall painting from the Tomb of the Augurs at Tarquinia, showing wrestlers and the “Phersu Game,” c.540–530 bce. Photograph by Romualdo Moscioni (24 133), American Academy in Rome, Photographic Archive 398

Figures xi

26.2a Drawing of the paintings on the rear wall of the Tomb of Chariots at Tarquinia showing athletic contests and spectators, c.500–490 bce, based on O. Stackelberg and A. Kestner, Unedierte Gräber von Corneto (1830), pl. 2 400

26.2b Detailed drawing of the painting in the upper left corner of the rear wall of the Tomb of Chariots at Tarquinia showing spectators and boxers, c.500–490 bce. German Archaeological Institute Rome (Schwanke, Neg. D-DAI-ROM 79.943 and 79.989) 400

28.1 Wall painting of gladiators from the Tomb of Vestorius Priscus at Pompeii, 76 ce. Photograph by Steven Tuck. Used with permission 426

28.2 Mosaic from the Porta Marina Baths in Ostia showing athletes, second century ce. Photograph by Steven Tuck. Used with permission 428

28.3 Front panel from a marble sarcophagus for a child, showing chariot race with Erotes as charioteers, c.190–220 ce, Museum of Art and Archaeology, University of Missouri (83.65): Silver anniversary gift of the UMC Development Fund Board and the Boone County Community Trust 429

28.4 Marble relief from the amphitheater at Capua showing reenactment of the Calydonian boar hunt, second century ce. Photograph by Steven Tuck. Used with permission 430

29.1 Bronze gladiator’s helmet from Pompeii, first century ce, British Museum GR 1946.5–14.1, © Trustees of the British Museum 439

29.2 Roman clay lamp from London (made in Gaul or Britain), showing gladiatorial combat, first century ce, British Museum P&EE 1856.7–1.336, © Trustees of the British Museum 446

31.1 Mosaic from Zliten, Libya showing a fallen gladiator appealing for missio while a referee restrains his opponent, third century ce, © Gilles Mermet/ Art Resource, NY 469

31.2 Mosaic from Zliten, Libya showing an injured gladiator appealing for missio, third century ce, © Gilles Mermet/Art Resource, NY 470

32.1 Marble relief from Halicarnassos showing female gladiators, first to second century ce, British Museum GR 1847.4-24.19, © Trustees of the British Museum 481

33.1 Bronze statuette of an African child charioteer (discovered in Altrier), second century ce, Musée national d’histoire et d’art Luxembourg, inv. n. 2004–15/1750, © MHNA Luxembourg/T. Lucas. 497

33.2 Marble funerary altar of T. Flavius Abascantus, 95 or 98 ce, Palazzo Ducale (Museo Lapidario), Urbino, inv. no. 41117, © Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici delle Marche 501

34.1 Lower register of ivory diptych made for Anastasius showing venatio, 517 ce (formerly in Berlin, now lost). Photograph from J. Helbig, L’Art Mosan (1906), pl. 4 516

35.1 Part of a mosaic from El-Djem, Tunisia showing damnatio ad bestias, c.180 ce. Photograph by Erron Silverstein. Used with permission 524

37.1 The amphitheater at Pompeii, c.70 bce. Photograph by Roger B. Ulrich. Used with permission 546

37.2 The amphitheater at Saintes, France (ancient Mediolanum Santonum), c.40 ce. Photograph by Myrabella. Used with permission 550

xii Figures

37.3 The interior of the Colosseum in Rome, c.75 ce. Photograph by Kacan. Used with permission 552

38.1 The circus at Caesarea Maritima in modern-day Israel, c.20 bce. Photograph by Odemars. Used with permission 565

38.2 The stadium at Aphrodisias in modern-day Turkey, late first century ce. Photograph by D. Enrico di Palma. Used with permission 568

38.3 The South Theater at Gerasa in modern-day Jordan, originally constructed in late first century ce. Photograph by Diego Delso. Used with permission 573

42.1 Mosaic from Smirat, Tunisia showing beast hunt and sponsor (Magerius), c.250 ce. Photograph by Vanni/Art Resource, NY 624

0.1 Some major sites associated with Greek and Roman sport and spectacle 5

1.1 Sites of the periodos games 24 1.2 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 1 32 2.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 2 37 3.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 3 57

6.1a–b Key sites mentioned in Chapter 6 101 8.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 8 134 8.2 Plan of the sanctuary of Zeus at Olympia and surrounding areas 139 9.1 Plan of ancient Sparta 14910.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 10 16111.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 11 17711.2 Plan of the sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi and surrounding areas 17811.3 Plan of the sanctuary of Poseidon at Isthmia and surrounding areas 18211.4 Plan of the sanctuary of Zeus at Nemea and surrounding areas 18411.5 Plan of the sanctuary of Zeus at Mt Lykaion and surrounding areas 18612.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 12 19313.1 Map of Laconia and Messenia 21514.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 14 237

16.1a–b Key sites mentioned in Chapter 16 26018.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 18 28819.1 Plan of the gymnasion at Delphi 29822.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 22 33423.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 23 35024.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 24 36624.2 Key regions mentioned in Chapter 24 36725.1 Plan of ancient Rome showing major spectacle sites 38426.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 26 398

maps and plans

xiv Maps and Plans

28.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 28 42429.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 29 44232.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 32 48140.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 40 59142.1 Key sites mentioned in Chapter 42 62043.1 Plan of Constantinople in the time of Justinian 636

notes on Contributors

Winthrop lindsay Adams (PhD, University of Virginia) is Professor of History at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, where he has taught since 1974. An award-win-ning teacher, he has authored a biography of Alexander the Great, coauthored a sports sourcebook on the ancient and modern Olympics, and published some three dozen articles and chapters in profes-sional publications on topics ranging from military and diplomatic history to ethnic-ity, imperialism, and Macedonian sports history. He served two terms as president of the Association of Ancient Historians, the largest scholarly association represent-ing the field in North America.

Gregory S. Aldrete is Professor of History and Humanistic Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. He is the author of Floods of the Tiber in Ancient Rome (Johns Hopkins, 2007), Gestures and Acclamations in Ancient Rome (Johns Hopkins, 1999), and Daily Life in the Roman City: Rome, Pompeii, and Ostia (University of Oklahoma, 2009) and is the editor of the Greenwood Encyclopedia of Daily Life: The Ancient World (2004). For

more information, visit his web site: http://www.uwgb.edu/aldreteg/.

Carla m. Antonaccio  is Professor of Archaeology and chair of the Department of Classical Studies, Duke University. Before going to Duke in 2005, she taught at Wesleyan University where she also served as Dean of Arts and Humanities. She was trained at Wellesley College and Princeton University. Antonaccio is codi-rector of the Morgantina Excavations (Sicily) and has also excavated in Greece and Cyprus. Her interests include the Greek Iron Age, colonization, and ethnic and cultural identity.

Sinclair Bell is Associate Professor of Art History at Northern Illinois University. He is the author of numerous articles, book chapters, and reviews on Roman spectacles and social history. He is the coeditor of five volumes, including Games and Festivals in Classical Antiquity (Oxford, 2004).

Giampiero Bevagna  earned his laurea from the University of Perugia in 1997.

http://www.uwgb.edu/aldreteg/

xvi Notes on Contributors

He was visiting lecturer at the Department of Classics of Dartmouth College in 2006–7. He currently teaches Italian and Latin literature and history at a liceo in Perugia, and lectures on Roman history at the Umbra Institute. His research focuses on Etruscan history and art, and Roman Republican history. His main interests are iconological analysis and the making and reception of symbolism through art.

Stephen Brunet  is Associate Professor of Classics and Affiliate Faculty in Kinesiology at the University of New Hampshire. His scholarly work focuses on such topics as the use of dwarf athletes in the Roman games and the careers of young athletes during the Roman Empire. He is coau-thor, along with Stephen Trzaskoma and R. Scott Smith, of the Anthology of Classical Myth (2004).

michael J. Carter   is Associate Professor of Classics at Brock University in Canada. He has authored several articles concern-ing the organization and logistics of gladi-atorial munera and is especially interested in the diffusion of these Roman spectacles into the eastern, Greek, regions of the Roman Empire.

paul Christesen, Professor of Classics at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, has authored Olympic Victor Lists and Ancient Greek History (2007), Sport and Democracy in the Ancient and Modern Worlds (2012), and various arti-cles on Greek historiography and ancient sport.

Hazel dodge  is Louis Claude Purser Associate Professor at Trinity College, Dublin. Her research interests include the architecture of ancient spectacle, the employment and symbolism of decorative

stones in ancient architecture, and the city of Rome. She has published extensively on Roman archaeology, including essays on buildings for staging and watching specta-cles. Recently she has published a volume on spectacle in the Roman world for Bristol Classical Press. A new source book on Rome with Jon Coulston and Christopher Smith is forthcoming.

roger dunkle,  Professor Emeritus of Classics at Brooklyn College, is the author of Gladiators: Violence and Spectacle in Ancient Rome (2008) and articles on ath-letics in Greek and Roman epic.

Chris epplett (PhD University of British Columbia), Associate Professor of History at the University of Lethbridge, has writ-ten a number of articles on ancient specta-cle, in particular the Roman beast hunts. He is currently writing a manuscript on the same topic.

Garrett G. Fagan is Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies and History at Penn State University. He is the author of numerous scholarly articles and the books Bathing in Public in the Roman World (Ann Arbor, 1999) and The Lure of the Arena: Social Psychology and the Crowd at the Roman Games (Cambridge, 2011). In addition, he  has edited Archaeological Fantasies: How Pseudoarchaeology Misre-presents the Past and Misleads the Public (London, 2006) and, with Matthew Trundle, New Perspectives on Ancient Warfare (Leiden, 2010).

donald G. kyle, Professor of History at the University of Texas at Arlington, has authored Athletics in Ancient Athens (1987), Spectacles of Death in Ancient Rome (1998), Sport and Spectacle in the Ancient World (2007), and various articles on ancient sport.

Notes on Contributors xvii

Andrew lear  has taught at Harvard, Columbia, and Pomona College; he is cur-rently a member of the Department of Classics at New York University. His research focuses on Archaic lyric and ele-giac, Athenian vase painting, and the his-tory of sexuality. He is the author (with Eva Cantarella) of Images of Ancient Greek Pederasty: Boys Were Their Gods (Routledge, 2008) and several articles, including “Anacreon’s ‘Self ’: An Alternative Role Model for the Archaic Elite Male?” (American Journal of Philology, 2008) and “The Pederastic Elegies and the Authorship of the Theognidea,” (Classical Quarterly, 2011). His next book, Ancient Greek Pederasty: History of a Custom and Its Idealization, is forthcoming from Cam-bridge University Press.

Hugh m. lee  is Professor Emeritus of Classics at the University of Maryland, College Park. He is the author of The Program and Schedule of the Ancient Olympic Games (Hildesheim, 2001) and articles and book chapters on Greek and Roman sports. His current research inter-ests lie in the history of the scholarship of Greek and Roman sport, in particular, the contributions of Girolamo Mercuriale, Petrus Faber, and Gilbert West. Since 1988, Lee has served on the editorial board of Nikephoros: Zeitschrift für Sport und Kultur im Altertum.

rose maclean  is Assistant Professor in the Department of Classics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She wrote her doctoral dissertation on the role of freed slaves in the development of Roman social values during the Early Empire and is working on a book project based on that study. Her research interests focus on the relationship between the Roman elite and marginalized social groups, with emphasis on the material record.

kathryn mammel  is a JD candidate at Yale Law School. She graduated summa cum laude from Dartmouth College in 2011 with a degree in Classical Archaeology.

Christian mann  is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Mannheim, Germany. He has authored Athlet und Polis im archaischen und frühklassischen Griechenland (2001), Die Demagogen und das Volk. Zur politischen Kommunikation im Athen des 5. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. (2007), and “Um keinen Kranz, um das Leben kämpfen wir!” Gladiatoren im Osten des Römischen Reiches und die Frage der Romanisierung (2011). He is coeditor of Rollenbilder in der athenischen Demokratie (2009) and the author of several scholarly articles on Athenian democracy and on sport and spectacle in antiquity.

Stephen G. miller, Professor Emeritus of Classical Archaeology of the University of California, Berkeley, is the author of Excavations at Nemea II: The Early Hellenistic Stadium (2001), Nemea: A Guide to the Site and Museum (2004), Arete: Ancient Greek Sports from Ancient Sources, 3rd ed. (2004), Ancient Greek Athletics (2004), and Plato at Olympia (2009).

Sarah C. murray  is Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Classics at Notre Dame University. She is the author, with Paul Christesen, of an article on Macedonian religion in the Companion to  Ancient Macedonia (2010, Joseph Roisman and Ian Worthington, eds.).

Jenifer neils  is the Ruth Coulter Heede Professor of Art History and Classics at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. She organized the exhibitions Goddess and Polis: The Panathenaic Festival in Ancient Athens (1992) and Coming of

xviii Notes on Contributors

Age in Ancient Greece: Images of Childhood from the Classical Past (2003 with J. Oakley) and is the editor of Worshipping Athena: Panathenaia and Parthenon (1996) and The Parthenon from Antiquity to the Present (2005).

nigel nicholson  is the Walter Mintz Professor of Classics at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. He is the author of Aristocracy and Athletics in Archaic and Classical Greece (Cambridge University Press, 2005). In 2005 he was named Oregon’s Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation, and in 2006 served as president of the Classical Association of the Pacific Northwest.

thomas Heine nielsen  is Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Ancient Greek in the Section for Greek and Latin in the Saxo Institute at the University of Copenhagen. In 1993–2003 he worked at the Copenhagen Polis Centre at the University of Copenhagen and was con-tributor to and coeditor of the Centre’s massive Inventory of Archaic and Classical Poleis (Oxford, 2004). His publications include books on Arcadia and Olympia (Defining Ancient Arkadia (1999), Arkadia and Its Poleis in the Archaic and Classical Periods (2002), Olympia and the Classical Hellenic City-State Culture (2007)) as well as numerous articles on Greek history, including studies on Greek sport and the Panhellenic sanctuaries at Nemea and Delphi.

Zinon papakonstantinou  is Assistant Professor of Classics and History at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He has authored Lawmaking and Adjudication in Archaic Greece (2008), edited Sport in the Cultures of the Ancient World: New Perspectives (2010), and coedited Sport, Bodily Culture and Classical Antiquity in

Modern Greece (2011). He has also pub-lished several articles on sport, drinking, leisure, and law in Archaic and Classical Greece.

david Alan parnell is Assistant Professor of History at Indiana University Northwest and is a historian of Late Antiquity and the Byzantine Empire. His dissertation is enti-tled “Justinian’s Men: The Ethnic and Regional Origins of Byzantine Officers and Officials, ca. 518–610” (Saint Louis University, 2010). He is the author of “A Prosopographical Approach to Justinian’s Army,” Medieval Prosopography 27 (2012), 1–75 and “The Careers of Justinian’s Generals,” Journal of Medieval Military History 10 (2012), 1–16.

timothy p. J. perry  is a lecturer in the Department of Classics at Dartmouth College. He holds a PhD in classics from the University of Toronto, where he wrote his doctoral dissertation on the theme of exile in Homeric epic. He works primarily on Archaic Greek poetry and culture.

Werner petermandl, an Austrian historian of antiquity, is lecturer at the universities of Innsbruck and Graz and coeditor of the journal Nikephoros (Zeitschrift für Sport und Kultur im Altertum). He has partici-pated in research projects on ancient sport and spectators. He is coauthor of the vol-umes Laufen (2002) and Ringen (1998) in the series Quellendokumentation zur Gymnastik und Agonistik im Altertum (I. Weiler, ed.) and has written several articles on ancient sport.

H. W. pleket, a scholar of ancient epigra-phy and history and retired Professor of Ancient History, University of Leiden, coauthored The Olympic Games (1976) with M. I. Finley, and has for many years published numerous articles and also

Notes on Contributors xix

commentaries and translations of recently discovered inscriptions. He has been on the editorial board of Nikephoros, and he has long edited the standard reference work for Greek inscriptions, Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum.

Sofie remijsen is Juniorprofesseur at the Historisches Institut at the University of Mannheim. Her main research focus is Greek sport from the Hellenistic period to Late Antiquity. She has published several papers on this topic, for example on sport under the early Ptolemies, on the Olympic Games of Antioch, and on pammachon, a Late-Antique combat sport, and she wrote her dissertation on the end of Greek ath-letics. She also published articles on other aspects of Greco-Roman culture in Egypt, for example brother–sister marriages.

david Gilman romano (davidgilmanro-mano.org) is Karabots Professor of Greek Archaeology in the School of Anthropology at the University of Arizona. He is the field director and the codirector of the Mt. Lykaion Excavation and Survey Project. He has been the director of the Corinth Computer Project (corinthcomputerpro-ject.org) since 1988. His publications on ancient sport include Athletics and Mathematics in Archaic Corinth: The Origins of the Greek Stadion (1993).

Jeremy rutter  is Sherman Fairchild Professor of the Humanities Emeritus and Professor of Classics at Dartmouth College. He is the author, with his wife, Sally, of The Transition to Mycenaean (Los Angeles, 1976), sole author of Lerna III: The Pottery of Lerna IV (Princeton, 1995), and coeditor of Constructions of Childhood in Ancient Greece and Italy (Princeton, 2007). He has written or coauthored more than fifty articles on the Aegean Bronze Age since 1975.

michael Scott  is Assistant Professor of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Warwick. He is author of From Democrats to Kings (2009), Delphi and Olympia (2010), and Space and Society in the Greek and Roman Worlds (2012) and editor of Risk (2012). His next book will be published by Princeton University Press in 2014. See www.michaelcscott.com for more details.

Jerry toner  is Fellow of Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge. He is the author of Leisure and Ancient Rome (Cambridge, 1995) and Popular Culture in Ancient Rome (Cambridge, 2009). His next book looks at how post-Classical historians and travel writers have used ancient texts to help them create various images of Islam and the Orient.

Zara martirosova torlone  (PhD Columbia University) is Associate Professor of Classics at Miami University of Ohio. She is the author of Russia and  the Classics: Poetry’s Foreign Muse (Duckworth, 2009), coeditor of Outsiders and Insiders in Russian Cinema (Indiana UP, 2008), and the author of several schol-arly articles on Vergil, the Roman novel, the Olympic victor list in the Chronicle of Eusebius of Caesarea, and the reception of antiquity in Russia.

Steven l. tuck  is Associate Professor of Classics and the History of Art at Miami University of Ohio. His scholarship includes articles on the spectacle schedule at Pompeii, the decorative program of the amphitheater at Capua, and triumphal imagery across the ancient Roman world. He is also the author of a history of Roman art forthcoming from Wiley-Blackwell.

ingomar Weiler,  retired Professor of Ancient History at the Universities of

http://www.michaelcscott.comhttp://www.michaelcscott.com

xx Notes on Contributors

Innsbruck and Graz (Austria), and lecturer for sport history and Supervising Professor at the International Olympic Academy in Greece, has published two monographs on  ancient sport – Der Agon im Mythos (1974) and Der Sport bei den Völkern der alten Welt (1981, 2nd edition 1988) – and many articles concerning agonistics and gymnastics. He is the editor of Quellen-dokumentation zur Gymnastik und Agonistik im Altertum (1991–2002) and coeditor of Nikephoros. Now retired, and honored by a festschrift (Mauritsch, Ulf,

Rollinger, et al. 2008), Dr Weiler is com-pleting a project on “Korruption und Kontrolle in der antiken Agonistik.”

John Zaleski  is a doctoral candidate in the study of religion at Harvard University, with a broad interest in ancient and medieval religious history. His recent work has focused on intellectual exchange among medieval Christians and Muslims, as well as the heritage of classical thought in the medieval Christian and Islamic worlds.

Acknowledgments

We would like to express our profound gratitude to our international team of over 30 contributors from some 10 countries for combining authoritative scholarship and innovative insights in their essays. We appreciate their efforts to sustain the volume’s emphasis on social history and the social and cultural significance of sport and spectacle.

The coeditors also wish to thank Haze Humbert of Wiley-Blackwell Publishing for encouraging this project and allowing us to define and pursue our own approach to the subject. Thanks are also due to Ben Thatcher, Felicity Marsh, and David Adams at Wiley-Blackwell for their help in the publication process, and to Teddy Henderson and Sophia Vazquez of Dartmouth College for their invaluable assistance at every stage of the project.

The endless patience and support of our spouses, Cecilia and Adeline, during the time we worked on this volume, and in all the years before, merits more appreciation than can be easily expressed in words.

Finally, while this project was in progress, the study of ancient Greek sport, and of Pindar and the early years of the modern Olympics, lost a great champion in David C. Young (1937–2013). A consummate scholar of great intellect, passion, and generosity, David energized the study of ancient Greek sport by challenging traditional illusions and biases. His The Olympic Myth of Greek Amateur Athletics (1984) made scholars rethink the social status of Greek athletes, igniting a debate that is still active today, as this Companion shows. For his many and major contributions to our understanding of ancient sport, we gratefully dedicate this volume to David C. Young.

Paul ChristesenDonald Kyle

April 26, 2013

A Companion to Sport and Spectacle in Greek and Roman Antiquity, First Edition. Edited by Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2014 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

General introduction

Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

This Companion draws on the expertise of three dozen scholars to provide a wide- ranging survey of the latest thinking about and evidence for sport and spectacle in Greek and Roman antiquity. All of the essays are intended to be accessible to a wide audience, ranging from scholars who study other aspects of Classical antiquity to people outside of academia with a serious interest in the ancient world. The Companion also seeks to advance the study of ancient sport and spectacle by emphasizing the need to understand sport and spectacle not as isolated activities but as part of a broader social canvas. The number of new and striking insights found in this volume is a testament to the promise of this approach, which we define in the discussion that follows as writing the social history of sport and spectacle. Even those with a thorough grounding in the study of ancient sport and spectacle are, as a result, likely to find much here that is worthy of close attention.

1 definitions, parameters

This work applies the terms “sport,” “athletics,” and “spectacle” to public, physical, espe-cially competitive, performances (contests, combats, etc.). It is helpful to define all of these terms with some precision because what properly constitutes sport, athletics, or spectacle is a contested issue (Holowchak 2002: 7–98; Kyle 2007: 9–11; Scanlon 2002: 7–9).

Derived from disporter (to carry away) in Old French, “sport” is an inclusive term that is used as a general rubric applied to activities ranging from play, pastimes, and physical education to intense professional athletics. “Sport” is a singular, collective term for a phenomenon; “sports” are individual activities that fall under the collective heading.

2 Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

An important distinction is that between “sport” and “athletics.” The latter is derived from the Greek words athlos (a contest for a prize) and athletes (athlete). “Sport” and “athletics” are sometimes used interchangeably, but in this volume athletics is under-stood as a subset of sport that involves public, formally organized competitions, typically with prizes for successful competitors. One small but important nuance is that the dis-tinction between sport and athletics does not carry over to the relevant adjectives, so, for instance, “athletic events” include both competitive and noncompetitive forms of physi-cal activity. Furthermore, “athlete” designates anyone participating in either sport or athletics.

“Spectacle,” from the Latin spectaculum, can be more easily defined, as a public per-formance (e.g., chariot race) with an audience. Recent scholarship has suggested that the traditional lines drawn between Greek sport and Roman spectacle need to be reconsid-ered. It was long standard to differentiate between Greek sport, which was habitually portrayed in a strongly positive light, and Roman spectacle, which was frequently por-trayed as a degenerate and degenerating activity (see, for example, Gardiner 1930: 118–19). More recent work, however, has emphasized that audiences were a key element of Greek sport and that the most notorious of Roman spectacles, gladiatorial combats, involved rule-governed duels between well-matched individuals that were fought in the presence of referees and that did not typically end in death. At least some gladiators in the eastern part of the Roman Empire understood themselves as athletes, and some scholars now argue that gladiatorial combat should in fact be understood as a sport (for further discussion of this point, see Chapter 42).

It is, therefore, important to be cautious about making stark distinctions between Greek sport and Roman spectacle, while also acknowledging important differences between Greek and Roman practices. Some Roman spectacles, such as public execu-tions, cannot be reasonably interpreted as a form of sport. High-status individuals in the Greek world were expected to participate in sport, whereas the participation of high-status Romans as performers in spectacles met with strong opposition (Edwards 1997). And although, after centuries of mutual exposure, Greeks came to support Roman spectacles, and Romans came to accept Greek sport, Greeks never abandoned their primary enthusiasm for sport, and Romans maintained their predilection for vio-lent spectacles.

2 the development of the Field

Over the last 40 years the study of ancient sport and spectacle has grown and matured into a thriving and dynamic subdiscipline of ancient studies. Increased interest in ancient sport and spectacle has inspired a stream of articles and books intended for both schol-arly and general audiences. The European journal Nikephoros is completely devoted to research on ancient sport, the Journal of Sport History (30.2 (2003)) and the International Journal of the History of Sport (26.2 (2009)) have published special issues on ancient sport and spectacle, and numerous scholarly monographs on those subjects appear each year. Works written for a general audience include dozens of accounts of the ancient Olympics (e.g., Spivey 2012) and Roman spectacles (e.g., Dunkle 2008), sourcebooks (e.g., Miller 2004; Futrell 2006), and reference aids (e.g., Golden 2004).

General Introduction 3

Research continues to provide exciting new insights. Recent discoveries include a series of poems on athletic themes by Posidippos of Pella, gladiatorial burials at Ephesos and York, and Hadrian’s letters from Alexandria Troas on athletes and festivals. Inspired by European scholarship (e.g., Weiler 1988), recent works have expanded their chrono-logical and geographical scope, incorporated comparative material, and suggested simi-larities as well as contrasts between Greek and Roman physical performances.

While the field has grown, scholars have until quite recently tended to analyze ancient sport and spectacle without paying much attention to the societal context in which these activities took place. The traditional focus was on issues such as the precise sequence of events at the ancient Olympics or the seating arrangements in the Colosseum. That approach – what might be called “sports history” or “event-oriented sport history” – was reasonable, indeed necessary, when our knowledge of ancient sport and spectacle was limited. However, most of the relevant body of evidence, which increases signifi-cantly but slowly, has now been thoroughly studied, and continued work on well-known sources along established lines already brings diminishing returns.

What we have learned over these 40 years has made it possible to ask new, bigger ques-tions about the relationship between sport and spectacle on the one hand and society on the other. We are now, for example, in a position to take what we know about the involvement of Greek colonists in the Olympics and to think about how sport helped Greeks who settled overseas, in places such as Egypt or Sicily, maintain a sense of cultural identity while living far from mainland Greece (innovative works along these lines include König 2005 and the essays in Hornblower and Morgan 2007). Increasingly sophisti-cated scholarship is looking at the significance of Rome’s varied program of entertain-ments – from the shows of the arena and circus to the acceptance and patronage of Greek athletics – for the ethnicity and self-representation of performers and spectators, as well as the sociopolitical dynamics of shows for elites and emperors (e.g., Beacham 1999; Fagan 2011). Such approaches, which might be described as writing a social history of sport and spectacle, have become increasingly common in the last decade and will likely dominate the field in the years ahead.

For anyone interested in ancient sport and spectacle, the continually expanding collec-tion of relevant scholarship presents both opportunities and challenges. We know much more about ancient sport and spectacle than we did 40 years ago, and we now have conceptual and theoretical approaches to study these subjects with increasing depth and sophistication.

However, the sheer quantity of the available secondary literature on ancient sport and spectacle makes it functionally impossible for nonspecialists to stay up with the field. Moreover, the continuing, rapid development of the field means that the scholarly con-sensus about such basic issues as when the Olympic Games began or where the first Roman amphitheaters were built has shifted significantly in the past decade.

3 the Aims and design of this Companion

There is, therefore, a need for a guide to what has become a large and complicated field of study, and our hope is that this Companion will fill that need. That said, we did not ask the contributors to this volume to limit themselves to summarizing what is already

4 Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

known about ancient sport and spectacle. Rather, we saw this an opportune moment to ask a mix of scholars, including some of the most established figures in the field and those just embarking on their careers, to think about ancient sport and spectacle from a social historical perspective.

The essays in this volume focus on the societal context in which various activities took place and delve into the relationships between sport and spectacle and between those activities and Greek and Roman society. Sporting discourse included contestation, nego-tiation, and acculturation, so chapters herein often integrate insights and models from the sociology of sport, New Historicism, etc. to interpret sport and spectacle as cultural performances and as communicative systems of meaning that both reflected and affected social values.

In carrying out this program of study, it was essential to move beyond the frequent but problematic tendency to concentrate on the ancient Greeks’ Olympics and on the Romans’ gladiatorial combats. The ancient Olympics, while illustrious, are problematic for social historical investigation. We know the names of about 25% of the athletes who won a victory at the ancient Olympics (Farrington 1997: 24), but in most cases we know next to nothing about those athletes. Nevertheless there have been determined efforts to distinguish athletes by social class, as examples of aristocratic privilege, or of upward social mobility from nonelite families (e.g., Young 1984: 107–70; Pleket 1992). The results of all such work are vitiated by the paucity of relevant evidence; we do not know even the names of the vast majority of the athletes who competed at the ancient Olympics, since only the names of victors were recorded. Moreover, the Olympics took place only every four years and included no more than roughly 200 athletes (Crowther 2004: 171–82). This means that even if we knew a great deal about every athlete who competed in the ancient Olympics, it would tell us relatively little about the vast majority of sport participants in ancient Greece, who, by definition, did not compete at elite levels.

In order to write a social history of Greek sport it is necessary to expand our focus beyond Olympia and take into consideration other sites, large and small, and to shift emphasis from individual heroes and feats to groups or classes and social dynamics. Most Greek athletes and spectators experienced sport in their own local festivals, stadia, and gymnasia throughout each year, and those experiences were a key part of Greek social, political, economic, and urban history.

This Companion thus includes essays on a wide range of sites and subjects relating to Greek sport. Geographical coverage is intentionally broad; contributions in this volume explore sport in a variety of sites and regions in the Greek world, including Athens, Sparta, the northern Peloponnese, the Greek West, Macedonia, Egypt, and Asia Minor (see Map 0.1 for some of the key locations covered in this volume). Other contributions consider important dimensions of sport such as its connection to democratization, edu-cation, gender, and religion.

Although this volume is not dominated by the ancient Olympics, Donald G. Kyle’s essay on athletic competitions (Chapter 1) and Thomas Heine Nielsen’s essay on Olympia and Hellenic culture (Chapter 8) highlight the importance of Olympia, which of course influenced other (especially Panhellenic) games in terms of events, procedures, and prizes. Abundant references to the ancient Olympics are also dispersed throughout other essays, for example in Nigel Nicholson’s discussion of Pindar’s odes for athletic victors (Chapter 4) and in Winthrop Lindsay Adams’s exploration of sport in Macedonia (Chapter 22).

General Introduction 5

Just as works on ancient sport tend to concentrate to an excessive degree on the Olympics, works on Roman spectacles often fixate on gladiatorial combat. Gladiators were the “stars” of the arena, but there was much more to Roman spectacle than gladi-atorial combats. Chariot races drew the largest crowds at Rome, beast hunts were popu-lar, and Romans came to accept Greek athletics as a subsidiary but nonetheless important form of entertainment. This Companion thus includes essays on a variety of different forms of Roman spectacle, as well as on sites at which Roman spectacles were held. It also looks at religious elements in and critics of Roman spectacle, people other than per-formers who played an important role in staging spectacles, and the relationship between spectacle and Romanization.

All books have emphases and limitations. This Companion concentrates on activities with a strong element of physical performance and does not explore all forms of ancient spectacle. More specifically, dramatic and musical performances and the Roman triumph are not discussed in detail. This is not meant to minimize their importance but to help ensure commensurability between the activities considered in the various essays and thus facilitate comparison and contrast between the roles played by sport and spectacle in the Greek and Roman worlds.

Investigations of ties or parallels between the ancient and modern Olympics, when aca-demic and not ideological, are joining a fashionable trend in cultural history to reception studies. Such works examine how later and contemporary cultures receive, perceive, and represent the cultures of earlier times. The study of the modern reception of ancient sport and the ancient body is a burgeoning field (see, for example, Kitroeff 2004; Goff and Simpson 2011; and Fournaraki and Papakonstantinou 2011) but is not included in this volume.

map 0.1 Some major sites associated with Greek and Roman sport and spectacle.

Lugdunum

Tarraco

Carthage OlympiaEphesos

Athens

Alexandria

Constantinople

Rome

6 Paul Christesen and Donald G. Kyle

4 organizational Structure: Sections, parts, and Chapters

After this introduction, the volume falls in into two broad sections, one on Greece and another on Rome. Each section has four parts, with some rough parallelism between Greek and Roman essays. Part I of Section I begins with an introductory essay that pro-vides an overview of sport and spectacle in the Greek world, Part I of Section II with a comparable essay focused on the Roman world. The remainder of Part I in both Sections I and II provide essential background information, including essays on the early history of sport and spectacle in the Greek and Roman world, respectively, as well as on the relevant literary, artistic, and material evidence, and recent scholarship. Parts II and III of Section I and Section II look at the places, performances, and people of Greek and Roman sport and spectacle. Essays in both sections contextualize the activities, settings, performers, and spectators with attention to issues such as class, gender, religion, and ethnicity. Part IV of both sections contain essays on the later ages of Greek and Roman sport and spectacle.

All chapters in this volume are similarly organized; the text of each essay is followed by a list of abbreviations (if any) used in that essay, references, and a brief guide to further reading that directs readers to relevant general and scholarly works. Readers looking for introductions to Greek sport and Roman spectacle are encouraged to begin with essays in this volume by Donald G. Kyle (Chapter 1) and Roger Dunkle (Chapter 25) and the references cited therein.

Greek names have been transliterated in such a way as to be as faithful as possible to original spellings while taking into account established usages for well-known people and places. It is, unfortunately, impossible to achieve complete consistency in transliterating the names of people, places, authors, and works without detaching oneself completely from earlier conventions or ruthlessly Latinizing all Greek names and words.

Some readers may also find it helpful to start with a clearer sense of the contents of each of the 43 essays that make up the remainder of this volume. Kyle’s Chapter 1 surveys basic background information – the actions, events, and settings – of Greek athletics. It answers standard questions such as: What competitions took place, not just in the Panhellenic games but also in local festivals? How were athletic festivals organized, who were the officials, and what were the rules and regulations? Who could compete? This essay is intended to provide a basic grounding for readers so they can better con-centrate on social history in other parts of the volume.

In Chapter 2, Jeremy Rutter confronts the daunting evidentiary challenges involved in exploring (pre-Greek) Minoan and (early Greek) Mycenaean Bronze Age sport. His detailed treatment shows that sporting performances had social, spectatory, violent, and ethnic variations – and political significance – from their earliest appearance. Among his many interesting suggestions are that Mycenaean depictions of bull sports on vases and wall paintings were intended solely for royal consumption and that, whereas boxers in Minoan Crete were probably members of high-status families, boxers in Mycenaean centers on the mainland were servile hirelings.

Timothy P. J. Perry’s Chapter 3 examines the earliest literary sources for Greek sport, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, as well as relevant visual and epigraphic evidence from the