PARIS (AP) — Have you ever wondered why French is spoken during medal announcements at the Olympics? The truth is that while the ancient Olympics originated in Greece, their modern incarnation is very much a French affair.
The Games were revived in the 1890s by a French nobleman, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, who now possesses a questionable legacy. As Paris prepares to host the 2024 Olympics, 100 years since it last held them, here’s why so much of the modern Olympics is quintessentially French.
It is related to the efforts of a French nobleman.
Coubertin was born in Paris in 1863 and dedicated his life to rejuvenating ancient Greek tradition. His heart, appropriately and somewhat macabre, rests in the Coubertin Forest in Olympia, Greece. Coubertin conceived of the Olympic Games as a pacifist exercise that could foster international cooperation and peace, especially after France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian War.
The modern Olympic Games were officially relaunched at the Sorbonne University in Paris in 1894 (130 years later, on June 23, a ceremony was held there) and for many years French was the only language of the Games. English was added decades later, although French remains a language of the Olympic Games, preserving the legacy of its founding.
While the first modern Olympic Games were held in Greece in 1896 to honor its ancient roots, the second Olympiad in 1900 was held in Paris.
“At the beginning of the 20th century, France was the world centre of art and sport,” says Patrick Clastres, a sports historian at the University of Lausanne.
The French influenced the connection between the arts and the Olympic Games
Coubertin also believed in the combination of “muscles and mind,” considering the combination of sports and art as a cornerstone of the Olympic spirit. He was inspired by the ancient Greeks, who celebrated both physical and artistic excellence.
Coubertin introduced the arts into the Olympic Games in 1912 with the “Pentathlon of the Muses,” competitions in literature, painting, music, sculpture and architecture inspired by athletics.
For Paris 2024, Coubertin’s legacy is being recalled in artistic competitions such as the “Pentathlon of the Arts” at the Palace of Versailles and similar initiatives at the French National Sport Museum in Nice. Some 1,000 French cities are taking part in the Cultural Olympiad, which promotes Olympic-themed cultural events.
“The ancient Greeks saw sport and the arts as linked under the umbrella of the humanities. It is important for Paris in particular, as a cultural capital, to celebrate this,” says Dominique Hervieu, director of the Paris 2024 Cultural Olympiad.
However, some experts question Coubertin’s intentions, calling them less than noble. He introduced the arts into the Olympics “in order to counteract what he thought was the vulgarisation of the Games by American commercialisation,” says Clastres. “Baron Pierre de Coubertin,” he says, “was a bit of a snob.”
France’s Olympic legacy includes a questionable figure
Perhaps one reason the French connection to the Olympics is not more widely recognized is that its founder is a persona non grata for many. Coubertin’s vision for the Olympics was inherently exclusionary, says Nicolas Bancel, a contemporary historian at the University of Lausanne. For example, he opposed women’s participation.
“She thought female Olympians would bring shame to the Games,” Bancel says.
The most serious accusation against Coubertin, however, was a personal letter he sent to Adolf Hitler praising the Nazi dictator and the Third Reich. Clastres notes that in the letter, Coubertin congratulated Hitler on the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
The Coubertin family association says that Hitler and Coubertin did not maintain regular correspondence. “The exchanges were conducted through third parties or were limited to a few polite letters,” a spokesperson for the association wrote in a statement to The Associated Press.
A tribute was held at the Sorbonne University in Paris this week to commemorate Coubertin’s 1894 speech to launch the first modern Olympic Games.
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach participated alongside dignitaries including Coubertin’s fourth-generation niece, Alexandra de Navacelle de Coubertin, and Princess Charlene of Monaco.
“What is sometimes missing in discussions about Coubertin is placing him in the context of his time. Every person has the right to be judged only according to his time,” Bach said. “France can be truly proud of Coubertin and his legacy.”
Are the Olympic Games a pioneering tool of French soft power?
France has long understood the potential of the Olympics as a tool of soft power, making it arguably one of the earliest modern examples of this concept. Soft power refers to a country’s ability to influence others through cultural or ideological means rather than military force.
Clastres notes that the 1924 Paris Games were the first modern Olympics in which media and propaganda were used to project national prestige. The French government used newspapers, radio and even military resources to broadcast the Games, establishing a press centre in the stadium for the first time.
In a pioneering move, France created a Sports Office within the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1920. “It was a French tool of sports propaganda to promote French interests,” says Clastres. This initiative marked the first time that bureaucrats were hired to promote national interests through sport.
“The French sporting power seized the monopoly of the image. All images were produced by the French sports authority and sold to the press. The photographers were paid by the French Olympic Committee,” explains Clastres.
France, devastated by the First World War but still possessing the prestige of a victor and considerable influence, sought to use soft power to improve its international standing. “France was largely destroyed by the war, but it was a victor, so it had great influence in Europe. It also had control of the League of Nations and wanted to celebrate this new era at the 1924 Games,” says Clastres.
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Tom Nouvian in Paris contributed. Follow AP’s coverage of the Paris 2024 Olympics on https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games
