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As we watch the world's best athletes represent their countries at the Olympic Games,

we thought it would be fun to look back at how this all got started so many

thousands of years ago.

Educator Armand-Dan Gore takes us back in time to ancient Olympiads and connects it to the modern

games we're all enjoying. It's coming up after a break.

Like TED Talks, talks, you should check out the TED Radio Hour with NPR.

Stay tuned after this talk to hear a sneak peek of this week's episode. thousands of years in the making what began as part of a religious festival honoring the Greek

God Zeus in the rural Greek town of Olympia has today become the greatest show of

sporting excellence on earth.

The inception date in 776 BC became the basis for the Greek's earliest calendar where time was marked in

four-year increments called Olympiads. What could it be? Why, it's the Olympic Games, of course.

Competition fosters excellence, or so thought the ancient Greeks,

in addition to sporting events, contests were held for music, singing, and poetry. You can read about them all yourself in classical

literary works like Homer's Iliad and Virgil's Iniad. Even mythical heroes appreciate a good contest

every now and then, wouldn't you say?

For the first 13 games, the ancient Greek Olympics

featured just one event, the 200-yard dash. But over time, new exciting

...