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GreekReporter.comGreek NewsNiarchos Foundation Buys Spyridon Louis' Silver Cup For Greece

Niarchos Foundation Buys Spyridon Louis’ Silver Cup For Greece

A silver cup given to 1896 Olympic Marathon winner Spyridon Louis for bringing his country its only win on its home ground was auctioned off and sold to the Stavros Niarchos Foundation for a record-breaking $860,000. The Culture Ministry made no attempt to keep it in the country and said it could be sold because it wasn’t that valuable.

It looked as if the cup, owned by Louis’ grandson, also named Spyros, would be gone before the Niarchos Foundation stepped up to save it at the auction at Christie’s in London, where the 2012 Olympics will be held this summer. Louis’ grandson said he wanted the money for his children and was selling it reluctantly. He said he was stunned by how much the engraved six-inch cup brought.

“Deep down I hope that the cup remains in Greece, but no matter where it ends up, it will forever represent the glory of my country, and I have no doubt that the new owner will treasure it as we have done,” he said after the sale.

He got his wish following what Christie’s called a “heated” auction that involved six bidders. The auctioneer confirmed the buyer as the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, a grantmaking organization set up in 1996 that plans to build a major cultural center in Athens where the Olympic cup will go on display from 2015. In the interim, a temporary home will be sought.

“Breal’s Silver Cup will be shared with the public and serve as a reminder of our history, heritage and resilient spirit,” said Andreas C. Dracopoulos, Co-President of the foundation, which has its headquarters in New York and offices in Athens and Monte Carlo. “Our hope, he says, ‘is that the cup inspires and rekindles Greek pride, just as Louis’ victory did on the last day of what would become the Modern Olympic Games.”

The cup, which Olympic historian Alexander Kitroeff described as one of the most important pieces of memorabilia associated with the games, smashed the previous auction record for an Olympic piece set in April 2011, when an Olympic torch from the 1952 games held in Helsinki was sold at auction in Paris for the equivalent of $400,000.

“The fact that the family managed to preserve the cup through more than a century of tumultuous events including several wars and foreign occupation of Greece symbolizes the importance that Greeks attach to their ancient heritage and the Olympic Games,” Kitroeff said in a statement, news agency Reuters reported.

The cup was named after Michel Breal, the French philologist who invented the men’s marathon race as part of the 1896 games. Inspired by the legend of the messenger Pheidippides, he had the idea to stage a race from the city of Marathon to Athens – a distance of 25 miles, and promised a silver cup to the winner.
Of the 17 athletes who began the race, only 10 finished, one of whom was later disqualified for traveling by carriage for part of the race. Louis, a previously unknown water carrier who allegedly sipped cognac on his way around the track and became a national hero for his victory, finished in just under three hours, eight minutes ahead of the second place winner and came into the venerable Panathenaic Stadium to the roars of Greeks and the country’s king.

(Source: Reuters)

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