Marathon of Marathons 2010 - PEI Media

The pre-race luncheon
In the footsteps of Pheidippides | Athens, 31 October 2010 20
Dr David Bellingham, Sotheby’s Institute of Art
The battle of
marathon
“The village of Marathon, being a
marathon in distance from the urban sprawl
of Athens, has changed very little over the last
2,500 years, and in Lord Byron’s timeless words,
“preserves alike its bounds and boundless
fame”. In the Romantic years of the early
nineteenth century, after Lord Elgin had sent the
Parthenon marbles to Britain, Byron continued:
“Marathon became a magic word;/Which
utter’d to the hearer’s eye appear/The camp,
the host, the fight, the conqueror’s career,/The
flying Mede, his shaftless broken bow;/The fiery
Greek, his red pursuing spear....”.
To the runners of the 2010 Marathon,
this “magic word” once more evoked the
topography, atmosphere and struggles of
the famous battle. The route of the race
deliberately veered off the straight main road to
Athens, in order to circumnavigate the funerary
mound. Several runners were equipped with
helmet, sword and sandals in memory of the
192 young Athenian soldiers whose ashes lie
beneath the mound which marks the epicentre
of the battle. Professor John Boardman has
counted precisely 192 men on the Parthenon
frieze (there are less today, but some of the
slabs are missing), and argues that the famous
cavalcade commemorates the Marathon dead
Dr David Bellingham
by elevating the majority from infantrymen to
equestrians, with magnificent pectorals and iliac
crests thrown in for good measure.
What do we know about the battle of
Marathon? It was fought between the (mainly
Athenian) Greeks and Persians in the summer
or autumn of 490 BCE. No one knows the
exact month or day, although sources tell us
of a full moon, and therefore it could have
been on September 11th, a highly significant
day, considering that Marathon decided the
future fate of the Eastern and Western empires!
Ancient historians - all Greek, and therefore the
numbers are probably exaggerated - tell us that
the Persians (Byron’s “Medes”) far outnumbered
the Athenians, but that the Athenians induced
a panic into the Persian ranks by a surprisingly
Dr David Bellinghaminto marshland, and over
6,000 died before they could reach the safety of
their ships.
However, the Persians were not yet beaten.
A second fleet was to the west of Athens, ready
to attack the city in a classic pincer movement.
Therefore, the surviving Athenians had to
race back to Athens within the day in order to
defend their wives and children.
According to Peter Krentz’s recent
scholarship, this is the real miracle of Marathon:
namely that soldiers, already wearied by the
battle, were able to cover the 26 miles back
to Athens handicapped with 50-70 pounds
of armour. Whether the legendary runner
Pheidippides arrived before them to announce
the victory and fall dead with exhaustion
remains a moot point – his feat is not mentioned
until several hundred years later. But the new
theory means that our commemoration of the
event is all the more remarkable and moving.
Few of us would be willing or able to run a
Marathon in nearly half a bodyweight of armour
- but we might if it were a matter of the life and
death of family and friends!”
Following his inspirational talk to the team,
David ran his first Marathon in just under five
hours.
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