by Norman A. Rubin

Created on: February 25, 2010

The Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games are in full swing and we are in the heart of the action through the written and televised media. Fans from different participating countries are at the games routing for their players and are celebrating their player's remarkable athletic achievements on the snow and ice. Winter Olympics together with the Summer Olympic Games are currently held every two alternating years.

In the year 776 B.C. a religious festival was held by the ancients Greeks dedicated to the glory of Zeus, and to celebrate athletic prowess. To the ancient Greeks the games were a religious event and they often held running games at religious festivals. The site of the first festival according to legend, took place in a glade called Olympia, surrounded by a pine forest on the northwestern coast of the Peloponnesus, in the year 776 BC. The Greeks then decided to the Olympian Games every four years at the sanctuary of the god Zeus. The Olympian Games that were held at that era included foot races, boxing, wrestling, javelin and discus throwing, chariot racing and even a contest for trumpeters. (Women were not permitted to compete in the games and they were not allowed to watch.) The games were held every four years until 394 AD when the Byzantine emperor Theodosius ordered them to be discontinued because they were not according to ethics of the new faith, and had a corrupting influence on the citizens of Byzantine. http://www.pantheon.org/articles/o/olympic_games.htm l

The Olympian Games were almost forgotten until 1896, when interest in them was revived by a sportsman and educator, Baron Pierre de Coubertin. The Baron succeeded in establishing the International Olympic committee, which enlisted the aid of sports organization and individual sportsmen worldwide.  The International Olympic Committee arranged the plans and the policy of the first modern-day Olympic Games and selected Athens Greece in April 1896 as the appropriate site for the first Olympics. The Games attracted the interest of 14 nations and 241 athletes who competed in 43 sporting events. The Games have been held regularly ever since, except for brief periods during World Wars One and Two. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_Games

Note: The Olympic motto is Citius, Altius, Fortius, (Latin - "Faster, Higher,) Stronger").  - The Olympic Creed "The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph

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