Games were held in nearly every Greek city and were a source of great pride to the citizens. The more important festivals were those held in honour of Poseidon at Corinth and called the Isthmian Games, those at Delphi which commemorated the slaying of the Python by Apollo and called Pythian Games, and the greatest of all, held every four years at Olympia in honour of Zeus, and known as the Olympic Games. These games were the oldest in Greece and they were at all periods the most important. The first were held, if tradition tells truly, before Greece had begun her history, and the last long centuries after she had ceased to be a free state. The first games in historic times were held in 776 B.C. and the interval between each festival was called an Olympiad. These Olympiads constituted the Greek calendar, which took 776 B.C. as its starting point. This great festival at Olympia was held in August {62} or September and lasted five days. It was a national affair and Greeks from all over the Greek world went to Olympia to take part in it. For a whole month a truce was proclaimed throughout Greece, all warfare had to stop, and all ordinary business and pleasure gave way to the greater business of going to Olympia. The games were usually held from the eleventh to the sixteenth day of this month of truce, the days before and after being given up to the journey to and from Olympia. All roads were declared safe for these days, and great was the punishment meted out to any who dared molest the pilgrims to Olympia, for they were going to pay honour to Zeus and were considered as specially under his protection. Visitors thronged every road and they came from every direction. They came from all the Peloponnesian states, from Corinth, Athens and Thebes. They came from the far-off Greek colonies, some from the shores of the Black Sea, looking almost like the nomads with whom they came so much in contact; some from Ionia, men clad in rich robes and of luxurious habits learnt from their Oriental neighbours; others from the western colonies, from Italy and Southern Gaul; and yet others, dark and warm-blooded men, from distant Africa. Yet all were Greeks, bound together in spite of their differences by the common ties of blood and religion. Some were rich, and were accompanied by slaves who brought everything necessary for their comfort, others were poor, who tramped the roads footsore and weary, but sustained by the thought of the joys of the festival when they reached their goal. {63}