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Modern depiction (1876) by Jean Léon Gérôme of a chariot race in Rome's Circus Maximus, as if seen from the starting gate. The Palatine Hill and imperial palace are to the left. Chariot racing (Ancient Greek: ἁρματοδρομία, harmatodromía; Latin: ludi circenses) was one of the most popular ancient Greek, Roman, and Byzantine sports.
In Greek, a four-horse chariot was known as τέθριππον téthrippon. [3] The four-horse abreast arrangement in a quadriga is distinct from the more common four-in-hand array of two horses in the front plus two horses behind those. Quadrigae were raced in the Ancient Olympic Games and other contests.
Cimon was a well-known chariot race organizer, winning three consecutive times the chariot race, one of the most important competitions of the Ancient Olympic Games. In fact, the renown of the victory in the chariot race was given to the organizer of the team, who was funding the chariot, breeding the horses and hiring the charioteer. [3]
The earliest reference to a chariot race in Western literature is an event in the funeral games of Patroclus in the Iliad. [4] In Homeric warfare, elite warriors were transported to the battlefield in two-horse chariots, but fought on foot; the chariot was then used for pursuit or flight. [5]
The Greek word for chariot, ἅρμα, hárma, is also used nowadays to denote a tank, properly called άρμα μάχης, árma mákhēs, literally a "combat chariot". The Charioteer of Delphi was dedicated to the god Apollo in 474 BC by the tyrant of Gela in commemoration of a Pythian racing victory at Delphi .
The depiction of this chariot race on the east pediment of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, along with that of the Twelve Labours of Heracles on the metopes of the frieze, relate to the location of the temple in Olympia; the chariot race and Heracles were both believed to have started the tradition of the Olympic Games. [3]
A depiction of an ancient Greek four-horse chariot, c. 530-520 BC. While most women in the ancient Greek world were kept in seclusion and forbidden to pursue athletic activities such as riding or hunting, Spartan women of the elite spartiate class [note 1] were trained to excel in sports.
The Charioteer of Delphi, also known as Heniokhos (Greek: Ἡνίοχος, the rein-holder), is a statue surviving from Ancient Greece, and an example of ancient bronze sculpture. The life-size (1.8m) [1] statue of a chariot driver was found in 1896 at the Sanctuary of Apollo in Delphi. [2] It is now in the Delphi Archaeological Museum.