— 425 — 



upon his return home "500 drMchnue and free rations for life in the 

 Prytiineura," and if a Spartan he was given the place of honor in 

 battle — the greatest distinction that a true Spartan could enjoy. His 

 praises were sung by the bards of Greece, such as Pindar and Euripides, 

 and her great sculptors, like Praxiteles, immortalized him in marble. 



The races run in this period of Grecian history were varied, includ- 

 ing four-horse chariot-races, horse-races with riders, loose races, two- 

 horse chariot races, and " special races for under-aged horses." How 

 the horses were trained is not described, but the entries were made 

 thirty days before the games, and "the charioteers and riders went 

 through a prescribed course of exercise during the intervening month." 



The ancient Roman sports were closely similar to those of Greece, 

 and racing was a prominent feature of the "Roman circus. " For the 

 Roman world," a writer says, " the circus was at once a political club, 

 a fashionable lounge, a rendezvous of gallantry, a betting-ring, and a 

 play-ground for the million." The Circus Maximus would seat 350,000 

 people. Chariot-racing was, according to legend, included in the 

 games inaugurated by the Tarquin kings in the sixth or seventh century 

 B. C, and it is recorded that in 329 B. C. stalls were erected for 

 chariots and horses in the jlJircus Maximus. The Roman games were 

 at their height in the recklessly prodigal Caesarian age, and the revenues 

 of whole provinces were squandered in these stirring spectacles. The 

 chariots were started in an oblique line, so that the outer one might be 

 compensated for the extra distance it had to travel. The horses and 

 men were furnished by the rich owners of studs, and the charioteers, 

 though mostly slaves, were greatly esteemed for their skill. " The 

 stigma under which a gladiator lay never attached to his calling," 

 writes a historian. The races were sometimes seven, but oftener four- 

 teen times around the circus — about five miles. Another variation of 

 ancient Roman horse-racing was races of riders who each had two 

 horses, and leaped from the one to the other during the 'contest. The 

 best racers of that day were said to have been the Sicilian, Spanish, 

 and Cappadocian horses. 



At a later period in Rome, in the time of Pope Sextus V — the latter 

 part of the sixteenth century — racing was pursued with great ardor in 

 Rome. Riderless horses (barberi) ran at the Roman carnival, and the 

 chroniclers say that Pope Sextus caused a lane to be inclosed with 

 palisades in the centre of a street, so that the horses in racing might 



