When more than 10,000 athletes from over 200 nations stride into the hot Aegean sun on the site of the first modern games, Milo of Kroton and his fellow forebears of the games will probably be rolling in their sarcophagi. In their day, nearly 3,000 years ago, only Barbarians would compete wearing anything but a delicate sheen of highly fragrant olive oil — to say nothing of letting women play.
Guests:
Christine Kondoleon, curator of Greek and Roman Art at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts;
Thomas Cahill, author of the “Hinges of History” series about Western civilization