Pausanias Analysis

In Elis, among the noteworthy sights is an ancient gymnasium. All the customary rites for athletes before they proceed to Olympia are performed by them here in this gymnasium. Tall plane trees grow along the running-tracks within the enclosure walls. The entire enclosure is called Xystos, because Heracles, the son of Amphitryon, practiced here, daily scraping away the thistles (xysta) that grew in the place.

There is a separate track specially set apart for contests among runners, which the locals call sacred, and another distinct area where runners and pentathletes practice their exercises. Within the Gymnasium is a place called the Plethrion; here the Hellanodikai pair competitors according to age or skill, matching them together for wrestling bouts.

In the gymnasium there are also altars to gods: one to Heracles of Ida, surnamed Parastates ("He who stands beside"), and others to Eros and to the deity whom both Eleans and Athenians alike call Anteros. There are also altars to Demeter and her daughter. For Achilles, however, there is no altar; instead, there is an empty tomb erected for him, following an oracle. On a designated day at the commencement of the festival, when the sun is setting towards the west, the Elean women perform certain rites in honor of Achilles and customarily lament him.

There is also another enclosure of the gymnasium, smaller in size, adjoining the larger one; and because of its shape, they call it the Square. Here they arrange wrestling schools for competitors, and here they also match athletes who are no longer wrestling, but competing with softer leather thongs for striking blows. In this place stands also one of the statues which were set up in honor of Zeus, as a penalty upon Sosandros of Smyrna and Polyktores of Elis.

There is also a third enclosure of the gymnasium, called Maltho, because of the softness of its ground. During the festival period, it is open to the youths for the entire duration. In a corner of the Maltho there is a bust of Heracles reaching down to the shoulders, and in one of the wrestling schools there is a relief representing Eros and the figure called Anteros. The Eros holds a branch of palm, while the Anteros attempts to take it away from him.

On either side of the entrance leading into the Maltho stands a statue of a boxer. The Elean curator of laws stated that this man was Alexandrian in descent, from the island situated beyond Pharos, named Sarapion, who, having come to Elis when the people were suffering a shortage of grain, provided provisions for them. In return, he was honored in that place. The time of his Olympic crown and his benefaction toward the Eleans was during the two hundred and seventeenth Olympiad.

In this gymnasium there is also the council chamber of the Eleans, and here they hold exhibitions involving both improvised speeches and writings of every kind. It is called Lalichmion after the man who dedicated it. Around it shields are set up, intended only for display and not made for the work of war.

From the gymnasium, the way toward the baths leads along a street called Silence (Siopē), past a temple of Artemis Philomeirax. The goddess received this epithet because her temple is near the gymnasium. As for the street named Silence, they say it received the name from the following event. When men from Oxylus' army had been dispatched as spies to gather information about the Eleans, they instructed one another on the journey that as soon as they approached the walls they should be silent themselves and try to overhear anything they could from those inside. These spies, therefore, secretly passed unnoticed into the city by way of this very street, gathered the intelligence they desired, and returned again to the Aetolians. Thus, the street received its name "Silence" from the spies' secrecy.