"Olympic Games" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... embassy, by means of pigeons, fixing the billet to the bird's tail. Hirtius and Brutus, at the siege of Modena, held a correspondence with one another by means of pigeons. Ovid informs us that Taurosthenus, by a pigeon stained with purple, gave notice to his father of his victory at the Olympic games, sending it to him at AEgina; and Anacreon tells us, that he conveyed a billet-doux to his beautiful Bathyllid, by a dove. Thus, says Bewick, "the bird is let loose, and in spite of surrounding armies and every obstacle that would have effectually ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 269, August 18, 1827 • Various
... Chron. p. 421. This pedigree from Temenus and Hercules may be suspicious; yet it was allowed, after a strict inquiry, by the judges of the Olympic games, (Herodot. l. v. c. 22,) at a time when the Macedonian kings were obscure and unpopular in Greece. When the Achaean league declared against Philip, it was thought decent that the deputies of Argos should ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... Olde Testament, it was ordyned, that whan on overcomen, he scholde be crowned with palme: and for thei trowed, that thei hadden the victorye of Crist Jesus, therfore made thei the overthwart pece of palme. [Footnote: The reference is to the Olympic Games.] And the table of the tytle, thei maden of olyve; for olyve betokenethe pes. And the storye of Noe wytnessethe, whan that the culver [Footnote: Dove. Anglo-Saxon, Cuifra.] broughte the braunche ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation. v. 8 - Asia, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt
... The Olympic Games were of greater efficacy than the amphictyonic council in promoting a spirit of union among the various branches of the Greek race, and in keeping alive a feeling of their common origin. They were open to all persons who could prove their Hellenic blood, and were frequented by ...
— A Smaller History of Greece • William Smith
... language upon this subject exceeding strong. He represents (1 Cor. ix. 27) his mind and body as engaged in combat, and says, "I buffet my body, and subject it." The word here translated " subject," in the original, means "to carry into servitude," and is a term taken from the language of the olympic games where the boxers dragged off the arena, their conquered, disabled, and helpless antagonists like slaves, in which humbled condition the Apostle represents his body to be with respect ...
— The Grounds of Christianity Examined by Comparing The New Testament with the Old • George Bethune English
... These records are taken from the World Almanac, 1906, and Olympic Games of 1906 at Athens. Edited by J.E. Sullivan, Commissioner from the United States to the Olympic Games. Spalding's Athletic Library, New York, ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... The full sentence, in the first ode of Horace, reads, "Curriculo pulverem Olympicum collegisse juvat." (It is a pleasure to have collected the dust of Olympus on one's chariot wheels.) The allusion is to the Olympic games, the most celebrated festival of Greece. Lowell puns upon the word collegisse with his own coinage, which may have the double meaning of going ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... This plant is supposed to be a native of western Asia, but now grows abundantly in Italy, Spain, and the south of France. Among the ancients the myrtle was held sacred to Venus and was a plant of considerable importance, wreaths of it being worn by the victors of the Olympic games and other honored personages. Various parts of the plant were used in medicine, in cookery, and by the Tuscans in the preparation of myrtle wine, called myrtidanum. It is still used in perfumery, and a highly perfumed distillation is made from the flowers. The fruits are ...
— Catalogue of Economic Plants in the Collection of the U. S. Department of Agriculture • William Saunders
... entering, they hymned the praises of the gods. When they rushed on to battle, they shouted their inspiring war-songs; and if victory crowned the fight, the battle-field rang with their joyous paeans, and their poets tuned their lyres in honour of the brave that had fallen. A victor in the Olympic games would have lost one of his greatest rewards, if no poet had sung his fame. Then, in their banquets, the Greeks amused themselves in stringing together pretty verses, and joined in merry and jovial drinking-songs. If there happened to be a marriage, the young ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... Olympia. The racing, wrestling and other contests of strength and skill were accompanied by sacrifices to the gods, processions, and banquets. There was a sense of dignity and almost of worship about the games. The Olympic games have been recently revived, and athletes from all countries of the world contest for the prizes—simple garlands ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... glorified in antique virtue. The Beauty of this natural Life and the Love of it was the soul of the Greek Ideal; and the nation continually cherished and cultivated and refined this Ideal with impulses from groves of Arcadia, vales of Tempe, and flowery slopes of Attica, from the manliness of Olympic Games and the loveliness of Spartan Helens. They cherished and cultivated and refined it, because here they set up their altars to known gods and worshipped attributes which they could understand. The Ideal was their religion, and the Art which came from it the expression ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... out rhymes and themes, and all the flux of quality at Bath contend for the prizes. A Roman vase, dressed with pink ribands and myrtles, receives the poetry, which is drawn out every festival: six judges of these Olympic games retire and select the brightest compositions, which the respective successful acknowledge, kneel to Mrs. Calliope (Miller), kiss her fair hand, and are crowned by it with myrtle." ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... then Croesus was informed that the Athenian was held subject and torn with faction by Peisistratos 64 the son of Hippocrates, who then was despot of the Athenians. For to Hippocrates, when as a private citizen he went to view the Olympic games, a great marvel had occurred. After he had offered the sacrifice, the caldrons which were standing upon the hearth, full of pieces of flesh and of water, boiled without fire under them and ran over. And Chilon the Lacedemonian, who chanced to have been present and to have ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus
... this day we boast the noted names of Longboat, Sockalexis, Bemus Pierce, Frank Hudson, Tewanima, Metoxen, Myers, Bender, and Jim Thorpe. Thorpe is a graduate of the Carlisle school, and at the Olympic Games in Sweden in 1912 he won the title of the greatest ...
— The Indian Today - The Past and Future of the First American • Charles A. Eastman
... tone. Around the table sat the directorcillo, two writers and some soldiers scribbling papers. The alferez walked from one side to the other, looking from time to time ferociously toward the door. Themistocles after the battle of Salamis could not have shown more pride at the Olympic games. Dona Consolacion yawned in one corner of the room, and disclosed her black palate and her crooked teeth. Her cold and evil look was fixed on the door of the jail, covered with indecent pictures. Her husband, made amiable by the victory, had yielded to her request ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal
... numbers exempt from rule: whether he sings the gods, and kings, the offspring of the gods, by whom the Centaurs perished with a just destruction, [by whom] was quenched the flame of the dreadful Chimaera; or celebrates those whom the palm, [in the Olympic games] at Elis, brings home exalted to the skies, wrestler or steed, and presents them with a gift preferable to a hundred statues: or deplores some youth, snatched [by death] from his mournful bride—he elevates both his strength, and ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... mine!" The applause of the Barbarians burst forth, while the Carthaginians, comprehending their disaster at last, shrieked with despair. Then he began to run about the platform from one end to the other,—and like a chariot-driver triumphant at the Olympic Games, Spendius, distraught with pride, raised his ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert |
