{"product_id":"the-olive-crown-the-cook-who-won-the-world-first-olympic-games-ancient-greece-776-bce-9798199752374","title":"The Olive Crown \u0026 The Cook Who Won the World First Olympic Games: Ancient Greece 776 BCE","description":"\u003cp\u003e • Author(s): Michael McGilbourne\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher: Independently Published\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher Imprint: Independently Published\u003cbr\u003e • BISAC: Historical - Ancient Civilizations\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe First Olympic Games Ancient Greece 776 BCE\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eYou are the end point of an unbroken chain of survival.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEvery person who came before you - through plague, war, famine, and flood - lived long enough to pass forward what was necessary for you to exist. You did not begin when you were born. You began when humanity began.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEverything that happened between that beginning and this moment is not the past in any abstract sense. \u003cb\u003eIt is the story of the making of you.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis book takes you to one of the most extraordinary moments in that story.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eOlympia, Greece. 776 BCE.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEvery war in the Greek world has stopped. Twenty thousand people have walked to a valley in August and agreed on something radical: that a body at its peak is the highest argument a human life can make. One sprint. One hundred and ninety-two paces. One crown of wild olive. No gold. No land. Only a name written into a permanent record.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe first name in that record belonged to a cook.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe arguments about what excellence truly is - and who is permitted to witness it - have never stopped.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Olive Crown and The Cook Who Won the World\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e asks what it meant to be inside that moment.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNot as a king. Not as a judge. But as the woman who trained her son on a ridge road before dawn for seven years, built the runner - and then stood outside the wall on the morning of the race she was forbidden to enter.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ci\u003eWhat does it mean to witness history from outside the place it is officially made?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ci\u003eWhat is the difference between a wall that excludes and a wall that reveals its own fear?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ci\u003eWhat did the first Olympic record get right - that the powerful had gotten wrong?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe facts are extraordinary enough.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe winner's olive crown could only be cut by a boy whose \u003cb\u003eboth parents were living\u003c\/b\u003e - requiring a mother to exist, then forbidding her from watching.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWomen were excluded on pain of death. The single exception: the priestess of Demeter, seated above the stadium - outside the boundary, watching everything.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe first Olympic victor was a cook. His name has been in the record for \u003cb\u003etwenty-eight centuries.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe dust of the road from Corinth in August. The smell of cedar smoke on the oldest altar in Greece. The roar of twenty thousand people the moment a cook from Elis crossed the finish line.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThey were curious about the same things we are. They built something still asking us questions.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFor homeschooling families: \u003c\/b\u003e You are already doing the most important thing - putting the story of humanity into your children's hands. The \u003ci\u003eBeyond His Story We Stand\u003c\/i\u003e series was written for you. Not a textbook. A story your child will not want to put down - that leaves them asking the questions only wonder produces.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Olive Crown and The Cook Who Won the World\u003c\/i\u003e - part of the \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eBeyond His Story We Stand\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e series.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe cook ran.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cb\u003eThe wall stood.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cb\u003eShe watched - and the watching became part of what was made there.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Independently Published","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":47968509100183,"sku":"9798199752374","price":1401.0,"currency_code":"INR","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0666\/3471\/1191\/files\/9798199752374.webp?v=1782918320","url":"https:\/\/atlanticbooks.com\/products\/the-olive-crown-the-cook-who-won-the-world-first-olympic-games-ancient-greece-776-bce-9798199752374","provider":"Atlantic Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}