258 MONUMENTS OF HIPPODROME AND MUSICAL VICTORS. 
a local victor, unknown at Olympia.!' Greeks of Sicily and Magna 
Grzecia were especially fond of such contests, as we see these constantly 
represented on coins of different cities there from the beginning of the 
fifth century B.C. on.2- However, only a few of the sites of these many 
hippodromes are now known, and only one can be positively identi- 
fied, that mentioned by Pausanias on Mount Lykaios in Arkadia.® 
The others are known from literary sources.4’ The one at Olympia was 
destroyed in the course of centuries by the floods of the Alpheios, and its 
exact location can not be determined, though we know in general that it 
lay somewhere southeast of the Altis, between the river and the Stadion, 
and surmise that it ran somewhat parallel to the latter.® 
Its measurements, however, are known to us from a Greek metro- 
logical parchment manuscript in the old Seraglio, Constantinople, which 
dates from the eleventh century A.D.° According to it the length of the 
course, 1. ¢., from the starting-point to turning-post and return, was 
about 8 stades (1538 meters, 16 centimeters) or nearly 1 mile. One of 
the two sides—which Pausanias says were of unequal length’—was 3 
stades and 1 plethron long. ‘The breadth of the course at the starting- 
point was 1 stade and 4 plethra. We are told, however, that only a 
portion of the entire course, six stades, or about two-thirds of a mile, 
was traversed in the various races. 
The oldest literary account of a Greek chariot-race is found in Homer 
in the description of the games of Patroklos—the longest and finest 
episode there described. But the first trace of such a contest goes 
1Besides 24 victories of both in various running races. The older part of the inscription (with 
a chariot-group in relief) was discovered by Leake: see Travels in the Morea, 1830, II, p. 521, and 
Pl. 71 (at the end of III); better reproduction by Dressler and Milchhoefer, 4. M., II, 1877, 
pp. 318 f.; 7. G. 4., 79; Tod, Sparta Museum Cat., no. 440. The newer portion is discussed in B. 
S. A., XIII, 1906-07, pp. 174 f. 2See Hill, Coins of Sicily, pp. 43 f. 
SVITI, 38.5; see Exped. scientif. en Morée, 1831-1838, II, p. 37, and Pls. XX XIII, XXXIV. 
It was 240 by 105 meters in extent, though the actual course was probably only a stade long. 
‘See list in Pauly-Wissowa, VIII, pp. 1743-4. 
5Described by P., V, 15.5 f., and VI, 20.10 f. For its position, see Doerpfeld, Ergebn. v. Ol., I, 
p. 78; Curtius u. Adler, Olympia und Umgegend, 1882, p. 30; Boetticher, Olympia: Das Fest u. 
seine Staette”, 1886, p. 119; G. Herrmann, de Hippodromo olympiaco, 1839 (=Opusc., VII, pp. 388). 
Five attempts at reconstruction are given by Hitz.-Bluemn., II, 2, pp. 643 f., and Pl. VI: those of 
Visconti (1796); A. Hirt (Gesch. d. Baukunst bei d. Alten, 1827, III, pp. 148 f., and Pl XX, 8; 
reproduced in Baum., I, p. 693, fig. 750; Smith, Dict. Antiq.3, 1890, I, p. 963; Frazer, IV, p. 83, 
fig. 6); Lehndorff (Hippodromos, 1876); Pollack (op cit., p. 52); Wernicke (Jb., IX, 1894, p. 199). 
To these should be added those of A. Martin (op. cit., p. 198, fig. 3844); Weniger (Klio, IX, 1909, 
p. 303, the aphesis transcribed by Gardiner, p. 453, fig. 164). See also Guhl u. Koner, Das Leben 
d. ae u. Roem.®, 1893, pp. 233 f. and Fig. 271 (=restoration of Pollack), and cf. Krause, 1, 
p. aie oe 
®See Blass, in Hermes, XXIII, 1888, p. 222 (n. 1); R. Schoene, 4. 4., 1897, pp. 77-8; id., Jb., 
XII, 1897, pp. 150 f. (Neue Angaben ueber den Hippodrom zu Olympia); Gaspar, in article on 
Olympia in Dar.-Sagl., IV, 1, p. 177 and n. 5; Frazer, V, p. 617; etc. TVI, 20.8. 
SIl., XXIII, 262-650. The four-horse chariot-race fills more than one and one-half times as 
many verses as the seven other contests combined (vv. 651-897). Homer’s description was often 
imitated by later poets, especially by Sophokles, Electra, 698-763 (race at Delphi); Nonnos, 
Dionys., XX XVII, 103-484; Quintus Smyrnzus, IV, 500-595; Statius, Theb., VI, 274-527; etc. 
Hesiod describes a race as wrought on Herakles’ shield: Scut., 305 f. 
