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The British Museum
Course: The British Museum > Unit 4
Lesson 1: Ancient Greece- Ancient Greece, an introduction
- Olympic games
- Victorious athlete: The Vaison Daidoumenos
- Prize amphora showing a chariot race
- A competitor in the long jump
- Sprinter on a vase from Rhodes and a bronze running girl
- Sophilos: a new direction in Greek pottery
- The Parthenon
- Egyptian blue on the Parthenon sculptures
- Bonnie Greer on the Parthenon sculptures at the British Museum
- A Hellenistic Aphrodite
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A competitor in the long jump
The long jump was the only type of jumping contest in the ancient Olympics. It differed vitally from our long jump in that athletes used pairs of weights or halteres, swung forward on take-off and back just before landing, probably as a handicap.
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There seems to be some sort of writing on the vase, you can see it at1:09. What does it say? It almost looks like sound effects from a comic… Not sure that's what it is, but it would be cool to think a vase in ancient greece was sort of the beginnings of the comic strip!(5 votes)
The letters you noticed between the figures generally spell the names of the figures painted next to them.(12 votes)
Why would they write on the vase, can't they just write it on something like paper?(1 vote)
I don't know for sure, but judging by where the writing is, it is either naming the events or naming the athletes pictured. Maybe both.
Sooo you win the National Bowling Tournament (or Running, or Discus or whatever) and now it;s time for the Awards Ceremony. Do you want the Trophy with Event name Year and YOUR name on it or do you want an Award Certificate? (Parchment, sheepskin, bark, papyrus, reed)?
Hmmm I'm thinking just like today you want Trophy and You want everyone to know what its for, and you want the trophy because you know it will last longer and look great on the ol' Domus fire mantel.
We are not that much different today, do you not think so too?(4 votes)
Are there other competions that are no longer in the Olympics today?(3 votes)
Unfortunately, there are no chariot races in modern day Olympics.(1 vote)
- Since we have some records of the long jump with weights why didn't we continue the use in modern times(2 votes)
Maybe they aren't all that helpful, or maybe the manner in which jumping is done now works better without them.(2 votes)
What prizes did they get if they won the long jump? I heard "glory" but what do you mean by that? Also was the long jump a major sport back then or was it an unconsidered sport?(0 votes)- They often got glory (kinda like fame), a lot of olive oil, and statues if they won the olympic event.(3 votes)
Why do modern day Olympic long jumpers not use weights like this? Clearly that was part of the sport!(2 votes)- Are there other competions that are no longer in the Olympics today?(1 vote)
How else does it relate to the "Long Jump" we have today(1 vote)
It is exactly like the running long jump of today but the only thing I can see that is different is the weights.(1 vote)
- It looks like it was remade like it was an artifact that was stolen some years ago.(1 vote)
1:09
Video transcript
this particular VARs chose the long jump and in fact it's the best depiction of the ancient long jump that we have the Greeks used weights for this event which seems rather strange to us people tend to say that the weights actually assisted the jumper so that he could jump that little bit further the idea is that he swung the forward on takeoff and then back just before he landed and you had to actually land cleanly on your feet if you landed on any other part of the body then you were disqualified the Greeks didn't preserve records of distances or speeds it doesn't seem to have been that important to them it was the winner at that time who gained all the glory and that that was the important thing but because when you think about it they didn't have the means to record speeds very closely or distances because they couldn't do it anything like a photo finish so it was actually what happened on the day that was important although having said that you can see that beneath the jumper there are actually three pegs now these might either record his previous jumps or they might be the jumps of other competitors but he seems to be doing better than any of them