The Olympic Games

Olympic.org provides an interactive timeline of every Olympics since 1896. Browse photos of the medalists, read highlights of the competition, and learn who presided over the opening ceremonies and torch lightings. For modern Games, including Torino 2006, you can take a virtual tour of the Olympic Village.

The Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland teaches visitors about the "sport, art and culture" of the modern games. Pictures and descriptions of many exhibits are available online and a virtual tour is available for those who are planning on visiting the museum. There is also a PDF document, “The Modern Olympic Games,” that tell what makes the competition and cermonies unique and how the Games have developed since Athens 1896.

Perseus Digital Library is maintained by Tufts University. In “A Tour of Ancient Olympia,” created in preparation for the 1996 Games in Atlanta photos of ancient vase paintings accompany intriguing sections. “Sports,” for example, details ancient Olympic events such as chariot races; “The Context of the Games & the Olympic Spirit” spotlights political influence in the earliest Games and discusses whether athletes were considered amateur or professional.

Scholastic outlines how the Olympics have changed: ancient Greeks used the event to honor gods, but today, the emphasis is on athletics, and the Games are highly influenced by politics, performance-enhancing drugs, and commercialism. Content is geared to elementary-school classrooms and, while informal, is helpfully straightforward and thorough.

Archaeology.org is a publication of the Archaeological Institute of America. The author of this article, a Classics professor at the University of Florida, tackles the subject of Olympic Games’ myths, including the idea that competing athletes must be amateurs. Other topics include the origin of the five-ring symbol and the lighting of the Olympic torch.

The University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology presents what it deems “the real story of the Ancient Olympic Games.” In it, the museum questions whether we’ve upheld the Olympic ideal in a series of sections dealing with athletes, politics, sexism, and commercialism.