The silver cup awarded to Greek runner Spyros Louis when he won the first-ever Olympic marathon at the 1896 Games in Athens will be displayed at the new Acropolis Museum for a year, starting on August 28. The news was announced by the 'Stavros Niarchos' Foundation, which bought the cup in an auction held by Louis's descendants in April with a promise to make it accessible to the public and put it permanently on display at the 'Stavros Niarchos' Foundation Arts Centre when this is completed in 2015.
In the meantime, the Foundation has selected the new Acropolis Museum as a venue that combined maximum security with ease of access for the public and has prepared supporting audiovisual and printed material surrounding the cup and its history.
During the year-long exhibition at the Acropolis Museum, the foundation will continue efforts to find other potentially suitable venues that could temporarily display the cup until 2015, when its own arts centre is due to be completed.
The silver cup, which stands just six inches tall, was inspired by the French philologist and philhellene Michel Breal, who proposed the men's marathon race as part of the first modern Olympic Games in 1896.
The Foundation bought the cup during a heated bidding session at Christie's involving six bidders. It sold for 514,250 pounds (860,000 dollars), breaking the auction record for Olympic memorabilia. (AMNA)
Posts
