In his right hand he carries a Victory, which, like the statue, is of ivory and gold; she wears a ribbon and – on her head – a garland

Cladeus, the river which, in other ways also,

This too is in the Town Hall, opposite the chamber where stands the hearth. In this room they entertain the winners in the Olympic games.

Before what is called Theëcoleon is a building, in a corner of which has been set up an altar of Pan. The Town Hall of the Eleans is within the Altis, and it has been built beside the exit beyond the gymnasium. In this gymnasium are the running-tracks and the wrestling-grounds for the athletes. In front of the door of the Town Hall is an altar of Artemis

altar of Apollo

he Leonidaeum is outside the sacred enclosure, but at the processional entrance to the Altis, which is the only way open to those who take part in the processions. It was dedicated by Leonidas, a native, but in my time the Roman governors of Greece used it as their lodging.

Outside the Altis there is a building called the workshop of Pheidias, where he wrought the image of Zeus piece by piece

Quite close to the entrance to the stadium are two altars; one they call the altar of Hermes of the Games, the other the altar of Opportunity.

After this stands an altar of Heracles surnamed Parastates (Assistant); there are also altars of the brothers of Heracles

The altar of Olympic Zeus is about equally distant from the Pelopium and the sanctuary of Hera, but it is in front of both.

It is far enough removed from the temple for statues and other offerings to stand in the intervening space, and beginning at about the middle of the temple it extends as far as the rear chamber

XIII. Within the Altis there is also a sacred enclosure consecrated to Pelops, whom the Eleans as much prefer in honor above the heroes of Olympia as they prefer Zeus over the other gods. To the right of the entrance of the temple of Zeus, on the north side, lies the Pelopium

The god sits on a throne, and he is made of gold and ivory. On his head lies a garland which is a copy of olive shoots.

The order of the games in our own day, which places the sacrifices to the god for the pentathlum and chariot-races second, and those for the other competitions first, was fixed at the seventy-seventh Festival.

The temple and the image were made for Zeus from spoils, when Pisa was crushed in war by the Eleans,20 and with Pisa such of the subject peoples as conspired together with her. The image itself was wrought by Pheidias, as is testified by an inscription written under the feet of Zeus:–

Pheidias, son of Charmides, an Athenian, made me.

The temple is in the Doric style, and the outside has columns all around it. It is built of native stone. [5.10.3] Its height up to the pediment is sixty-eight feet, its breadth is ninety-five, its length two hundred and thirty.

It is said that the victors proclaimed were: for the chariot and pair, Belistiche, a woman from the seaboard of Macedonia; for the ridden race,

The contests for boys have no authority in old tradition, but were established by the Eleans themselves because they approved of them. The prizes for running and wrestling open to boys were instituted at the thirty-seventh Festival; Hipposthenes of Lacedaemon won the prize for wrestling, and that for running was won by Polyneices of Elis. At the forty-first Festival they introduced boxing for boys, and the winner out of those who entered for it was Philytas of Sybaris.

This I can prove; for when the unbroken tradition of the Olympiads began there was first the foot-race, and Coroebus an Elean was victor. There is no statue of Coroebus at Olympia, but his grave is on the borders of Elis

, the games, and to have called them Olympic. So he established the custom of holding them every fifth15 year, because he and his brothers were five in number.

The victors crowned by Heracles include Iolaus, who won with the mares of Heracles. So of old a competitor was permitted to compete with mares which were not his own. Homer,16 at any rate, in the games held in honor of Patroclus, has told how Menelaus drove a pair of which one was Aetha, a mare of Agamemnon, while the other was his own horse.

eracles, being the eldest, matched his brothers, as a game, in a running-race, and crowned the winner with a branch of wild olive, of which they had such a copious supply that they slept on heaps of its leaves while still green

These things then are as I have described them. As for the Olympic games, the most learned antiquaries of Elis say that Cronus was the first king of heaven

As you go from Scillus along the road to Olympia, before you cross the Alpheius,there is a mountain with high, precipitous cliffs. It is called Mount Typaeum. It is a law of Elis to cast down it any women who are caught present at the Olympic games, or even on the other side of the Alpheius, on the days prohibited to women.

Among the offerings of Micythus is Struggle carrying jumping-weights, the shape of which is as follows. They are half of a circle, not an exact circle but elliptical, and made so that the fingers pass through as they do through the handle of a shield. Such are the fashion of them. By the statue of Struggle are Dionysus, Orpheus the Thracian, and an image of Zeus which I mentioned just now.75 They are the works of Dionysius of Argos.76 They say that Micythus set up other offerings also in addition to these, and that they formed part of the treasures taken away by Nero.

Council Chamber

By the side of what is called the Hippodamium is a semicircular stone pedestal,

These I saw myself as they were being dug out. A temple of no great size in the Doric style they have called down to the present day Metroum,51 keeping its ancient name. No image lies in it of the Mother of the gods, but there stand in it statues of Roman emperors. The Metroum is within the Altis, and so is a round building called the Philippeum. On the roof of the Philippeum is a bronze poppy which binds the beams together.

It remains after this for me to describe the temple of Hera and the noteworthy objects contained in it.