Just how far back in history organized contests were held remains a matter of debate, but it is reasonably certain that they occurred in Greece almost 3,000 years ago. However ancient in origin, by the end of the 6th century BC at least four Greek sporting festivals, sometimes called "classical games," had achieved major importance: the Olympic Games, held at Olympia; the Pythian Games at Delphi; the Nemean Games at Nemea; and the Isthmian Games, held near Corinth.[1] The Olympic Games were perhaps the greatest of these sporting events, and all Olympian victors were highly appreciated among the Greeks.
The sophist Hippias of Elis was the first who drew up the list of Olympians in his work Olympians inscription, based perhaps on the records of Olympia, and the oral tradition memories of the older Olympiads were still live in Olympia. Conventional beginning was considered the Olympiad of 776 BC, when Coroebus of Elis win the foot race named stadion. The work of Hippias revised and continued in the 4th century BC by Aristotle, later by Eratosthenes, then by Phlegon of Tralles (Seleucia of Caria) and many others. Thus formed a kind of Olympians' chronicle, which was already in 3rd century BC the base of the ancient dating system.[note 1] Than younger tables survives complete the list of stadion winners by Sextus Julius Africanus (for the first 249 Olympiads), which included in a book by Eusebius of Caesarea.[2][3]
The table below is an attempt to give a list (as complete as possible) of Olympic winners in the Archaic period (776 BC to 480 BC) combining all surviving sources. The work is based on records in the surviving historical and literary sources, race inscriptions, the texts of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, the testimony of Pausanias and the list of Sextus Julius Africanus. The first column shows the serial number of any Olympiad, the second column the same date, the third column contains the game and the fourth column lists the name and origin of the winner, or marked with [...] if the element is not readable on the papyrus and giving whenever possible a version of what could contain when an investigation exists over this element.[2][3][4][5]
The supplementary list contains Olympic winners of this period known from literary and epigraphic records, but who have been dated only approximately and cannot be included in specific Olympiads.[3]
^He won six times at the Olympic games, six times at the Pythian games, ten times at the Isthmian games, and nine times at the Nemean games, according to Eusebius p. 202.
^In 484 BC and 480 BC according to FHW. Also there are references to wrestling by athlete Theopombus according to HHN, p. 503 (wrestling) and p. 507 (pentathlon).
^In 500 BC and 496 BC (according to FHW), or in 492 BC and 488 BC (according to HHN, p. 503).
"Archaic Hellenism". History of Hellenic Nation (in Greek). Vol. 2. Athens Publishing. 1971. pp. 502–507. ISBN960-213-097-0. OCLC636806977. OL18546042M. Athens Academy Award 1980
Karl Otfried Müller (1839). The history and antiquities of the Doric race. Vol. 2. Translated by Lewis, George Cornewall; Tufnell, Henry. London: Murray (Robarts - University of Toronto). pp. 446–462 App. VI.
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