The character of the competitions themselves underwent little change during this period. Such changes as took place were due to changes in the conditions of war and to the increased importance of light-armed troops and cavalry.[180] Not only were equestrian events multiplied, but separate competitions were introduced in javelin-throwing and in archery. The javelin had hitherto been confined to the pentathlon. Now we find separate prizes offered for javelin-throwing, both on foot and on horseback, at a target as well as for distance. But such innovations seem to have been confined to local festivals like the Panathenaea, and found no place in the programme of the great festivals. The brutalising effects of professionalism may be traced in the change of the caestus. The soft leather thongs which alone appear on the fifth-century vases were, by the addition of bands of hard leather round the knuckles, developed into the formidable weapon called the σφαῖρα, which we see depicted on the Panathenaic vase in Fig. 135. It is curious to find Plato commending the use of the σφαῖρα on account of its brutality as more closely reproducing the conditions of warfare, and so more suitable for training soldiers than the “soft thongs.” We are less surprised at the approval with which he and Aristotle regard the pentathlon, the one competition which required the all-round development of the older athletics. But it is to be feared that this event was not really popular. Of the victors in the pentathlon at Olympia during this period we know only three, and of these, two, Stomius and Hysmon, were Eleans, the third the Athenian Callippus, who owed his victory to corruption. Of the statues erected at Olympia the vast majority were in honour of boxing, wrestling, and the pankration.[181]