Modern Olympics Celebrates 120th Anniversary Today

Athens: Modern Olympic Games celebrates its 120th birth anniversary today as it took place between April 6 and April 15, 1896 in Athens, Greece.

Only 14 countries participated in the original tournament and there were only nine sports and 43 events, but over the next century it grew in prestige to the international sporting festival it is today.

Most noteworthy event of the first Modern Olympic Games was the marathon, which had the greatest number of international athletes ever.

In honor of the day, Google has doodled to celebrate the modern incarnation of the ancient Olympic Games. Designed by Olivia Huynh, the doodle shows four different scenes from the event. Each of them can be seen by refreshing the homepage.

The Ancient Olympic Games were athletic festivals held every four years in Olympia, Greece from around 776BC, where athletes would compete to win wrestling, chariot racing and running races, among many other sports. While definitive records are few and far between, the rising influence of the Roman Empire is believed to have caused the decline of the formally-organized Games. It is believed that the Christian emperor Theodosius I legally abolished “pagan” events like the Games, in 393 or 394 A.D.

In the 19th century, European philanthropists were inspired to revive the ancient tournament as a way to improve the “moral and physical education” of the masses. 

Greek philanthropists Evangelos and Konstantinos Zappas paid for the restoration of the ancient Panathenaic Stadium where they sponsored the first games held there in 1859, then again in 1870 and 1875. The village of Wenlock in Shropshire began hosting its own annual local Olympics in 1850. It was devised by local doctor William Penny Brookes and is still held to this day. 

Baron Pierre de Frédy, Baron de Coubertin visited the town in 1890 and was inspired by the townspeople participating in the Games so he founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to work towards establishing a new form of Olympic Games every four years. Eventually the first Summer Games held under the IOC took place in the Panathinaiko Stadium during 1896, which was partly funded by a trust left by the two cousins to the Greek government. Since then, the Modern Games have been played.

The Modern Olympic Games have continued to be staged once every four years with the exception of 1940 and 1944 due to World War II. Women were not allowed to play in the first Olympic Games, but were allowed since the second Olympic Games in Paris in 1900.

The 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, is the first to be held in South America, from August 5, 2016 to August 21, 2016. It is the 31st edition of the games. The program features 28 sports and a total of 306 events. It will see 10,500 athletes from 206 nations participating in it.