Stadion (running race)

Common card · No. 458697

Stadion or stade (Ancient Greek: στάδιον) was an ancient running event and also the facility in which it took place, as part of Panhellenic Games including the Ancient Olympic Games. The event was one of the five major Pentathlon events and the premier event of the gymnikos agon (γυμνικὸς ἀγών "nude competition"). From the years 776 to 724 BC, the stadion was the only event at the Olympic Games. The victor (the first of whom was Coroebus of Elis) gave his name to the entire four-year Olympiad, allowing modern knowledge of nearly all of them. The stadion was named after the facility in which it took place. This word became stadium in Latin, which became the English "stadium". The race also gave its name to the unit of length, the stadion. There were other types of running events, but the stadion was the most prestigious; the winner was often considered to be the winner of an entire Games. Though a separate event, the stadion was also part of the ancient Pentathlon. At the Olympic Games,...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Robin Iversen Rönnlund, CC BY-SA 3.0