Spartan sport laid bare

摘要

The original Olympic Games, first recorded in 776 bc at Olympia, Greece, were driven by the Greek cult of the body beautiful and the body athletic. This is directly reflected in ancient sculptures of the male form. Revered physiques were of two types - the slender and graceful form typified by Apollo, and the rugged muscularity of Hercules.Among early Greek cultures, the militaristic state of Sparta alone accorded women a status comparable with that of men in the cultivation of an athletic physique. Plutarch tells us that Lycurgus, the severe law-giver of Sparta, "ordered the maidens to exercise themselves with wrestling, running, throwing the quoit, and casting the dart, to the end that the fruit they conceived might, in strong and healthy bodies, take firmer root and find better growth".