THE OLYMPIC TORCH SYMBOL:
The Olympic flame or Olympic torch is a symbol of the Olympic Games. Its origins lie in ancient Greece, when a fire was kept burning throughout the celebration of the ancient Olympics.
The Olympic torch is ignited several months before the beginning of the Olympics at the site of the ancient Olympics, in Olympia. Before the flame begins its journey to the site of the Olympics, it is used to light a torch in Coubertin Grove, in honour of Pierre de Coubertin.
The flame is then taken by a torch relay across national borders to the site of the Olympics. It is transferred from torch to torch, and wherever possible, it is carried by runners who run a kilometre each. Sometimes, it is taken by boat or plane. The relay ends on the day of the opening ceremony in the central stadium of the Games.
After being lit, the flame continues to burn throughout the celebration of the Olympics until it is extinguished at the end of the closing ceremony of the Games.
The Olympic flame was first lit at the 1928 Olympic Games held at Amsterdam. It burned throughout the games atop a high tower, and was extinguished on the day the Games ended. The flame itself represents a number of things, including purity and the endeavour for perfection.
THE FIRST STADIUM:
The International Sports Convention decided, in 1894, to revive the ancient Olympics and symbolically selected the city of Athens to host the first modern Olympics. The plans for the construction of a stadium were assigned to the architect Anastassios Metaxas, and the project was financed by Georgios Averoff, a Greek millionaire. In 1896, the Panathenean Stadium, meaning in Greek ‘the stadium of all Athenians’, was used for the first version of Olympic Games of modern times.
