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As you return home, your city-state tears down a portion of its defensive walls to let you enter—for what need has a city of walls when it is guarded by an Olympic champion? Your name will be carved in stone, your meals will be free for life, and poets like Pindar will sing of your glory long after the fire at Olympia has flickered out. The Legacy

On the final day, you stand before the Temple of Zeus. There is no prize money. Instead, the judges place a simple wreath of wild olive leaves ( kotinos ) upon your head. As you return home, your city-state tears down

The herald cries out, the trumpet sounds, and you sprint. The stadion race is a blur of gasping lungs and pounding hearts. When you cross the finish line first, you aren't just a cook anymore. You are a hero of Greece. Beyond the Race There is no prize money

: In the Hippodrome, four-horse teams thunder around the posts, wheels splintering in "shipwrecks" that leave the crowd breathless. The Victor's Reward The stadion race is a blur of gasping

In the heart of the sanctuary, the colossal gold-and-ivory statue of Zeus watches over the valley. For a few weeks, the clanging of swords across Greece has fallen silent. The ( ekecheiria ) is in effect—a divine command that transforms a landscape of warring city-states into a single, unified congregation of Hellenes. The Morning of the Games

: A grueling test of jumping, flinging the heavy bronze discus, hurling the javelin, wrestling, and running.

For over a thousand years, the flame burned every four years, until the Roman Emperor Theodosius I silenced the Games in 393 CE. Yet, the spirit of the gymnasion and the dream of the "Sacred Truce" survived, waiting in the soil of Olympia to be reborn in the modern era.