Olympiad
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a period of four years, being the interval from one celebration of the Olympic games to another, by which the ancient Greeks reckoned their with the 776th year before the birth of Christ. The last Olympiad was the 293rd, corresponding to the year A. D. 393. OLYMPIC GAMES. These games, so famous among the Greeks, said to have been instituted in honor of Jupiter by the Idæi Dactyli, 1453 b. c., or by Pelops, 1307 B. c., revived by Iphitus 884 b. C., were held at the beginning of every fifth year, on the banks of the Alpheus, near Olympia, in the Peloponnesus, now the Morea, to exercise the youth in five kinds of combats, the conquerors being highly honored. The prize contended for was a crown made of a kind of wild olive, appropriated to this use. The festival was abolished by Theodosius, A. D. 394. In 1896, after a lapse of more than 1,500 were revived at years, these games Athens. They began April 6 and continued for five consecutive days. The number of spectators was enormous. Athletes from various countries of the world competed for prizes, and some of the principal contests were won by Americans. These games consisted of foot racing, wrestling, fencing, swimming, olive branches. In July, 1900, the second series was held in Paris, France, and was a great success. Americans again won a large portion of the events. At the meet at Stockholm, 1912, the score of American athletes was 85 per cent., leading all other nations. The World War prevented a meet in Berlin in 1916. Olympic games were held in Brussels in 1920.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Collier's, writing in 1921, had the most recent Games only slightly wrong: the 1920 Olympiad was held at Antwerp, not Brussels, and the Berlin Games it says the World War prevented were indeed cancelled in 1916 — as were those of 1940 and 1944. Since then the festival has grown beyond anything the entry imagined: Winter Games were added in 1924, the Games returned to Athens in 2004, and summer and winter editions now alternate every two years, with the Tokyo Games of 2020 postponed to 2021 by the covid pandemic. The frank scorekeeping by nation ("the score of American athletes was 85 per cent.") reflects an era before the modern medal-table conventions and before boycotts, such as those of 1980 and 1984, made national tallies political. On the ancient side the traditional date of 776 B.C. for the first Olympiad is still the standard reckoning, though scholars now doubt that Theodosius I formally abolished the festival in 394, and there is evidence the contests limped on for decades after.
Written for this edition, 2026.