Although most people down under believe that the Olympics were invented so that Australia can smash the pomes at as many sports as possible in a three week period it was actually the Ancient Greeks that first brought us this sporting spectacle. But far from the have the numerous events that make up today’s epic games the first recorded Olympics that took place in 776 BCE had just one, The Stade, which was a run of approximately 192 meters or 210 yards in the old language. The race was won by a man by the name of, Coroebus, who blitzed the field with his family jewels swinging in the wind. The games took place every four and grew to include many more events such as boxing where the only rule was that you were not allowed to kill your opponent, wrestling and discuss. These ancient games took place for nearly 1200 years before the Roman Emperor Theodosius banned them in the year 393 CE because of their pagan origin.

It would be another 1500 years before the games would once again become pinnacle of the sporting world after Frenchman Pierre de Coubertin pitched the idea of an Olympic revival to his countrymen. His idea apparently stemmed from France’s poor showing at the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 when Pierre was just seven. It was said that the French army had lacked the vigor of its German counterparts and it was thought that introducing more sports in to the education system was a way of stemming this gap. Coubertin first tried to revive the Olympics in 1892 at a meeting of his newly formed, Union des Sociétés Francaises de Sports Athlétiques (USFSA), by saying:

“Let us export our oarsmen, our runners, our fencers into other lands. That is the true Free Trade of the future; and the day it is introduced into Europe the cause of Peace will have received a new and strong ally. It inspires me to touch upon another step I now propose and in it I shall ask that the help you have given me hitherto you will extend again, so that together we may attempt to realise, upon a basis suitable to the conditions of our modern life, the splendid and beneficent task of reviving the Olympic Games.”

But the speech did little to inspire the room and it wasn’t until 1894 that Pierre, who was now like a dog with a bone, managed to get together people and delegates from different countries that were more than fond of his idea. His second speech to the 79 interested parties had more of an effect with the Frenchman asked to set up a committee to oversee the planning and organization of the first Olympics in over a thousand years. This was the birth of the International Olympic Committee who chose a Greek by the name of Demetrious Vikelas and Athens as the very first host city.

Read more: London 2012 Olympics