Bybon

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Ancient Greek athlete

title: "Bybon" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["year-of-birth-unknown", "year-of-death-unknown", "greek-male-weightlifters", "ancient-greek-sportspeople", "6th-century-bc-greek-people"] description: "Ancient Greek athlete" topic_path: "sports" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bybon" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Ancient Greek athlete ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/Bybon.jpg" caption="Bybon sandstone."] ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/Bybon's_stone_inscription_(cropped).jpg" caption="The isolated inscription of the stone."] ::

Bybon was an athlete who lived in Ancient Greece during the early 6th century BC.

The only known information of him comes from an inscription bearing his name on a sandstone in Olympia, Greece. The stone which weighs 143.5 kg contains two deep notches carved out of it, forming a handle so that the stone could be used as a free weight. It reads:

::quote ΒΥΒΟΝ ΤΕΤΕΡΕΙ ΧΕΡΙ [sic] ΥΠΕΡ ΚΕΦΑΛΑΣ ΥΠΕΡΕΒΑΛΕΤΟ ΟΦΟΛΑ Bybon, son of Phola, has lifted me over [his] head with one hand ::

Historian E. Norman Gardinier translates the word 'lifted' as 'threw'. In regard to the athletic culture in which such a throw may have been made he states:

"The typical athlete of the period, as we know him from the records and from the black-figured vases, was the strongman, wrestler, boxer, or pankratiast. Many stories were told of their strength. One of them, named Bybon, left behind at Olympia an interesting record. It is a block of red sandstone weighing 316 lb., and on it is inscribed the statement that he threw it over his head with one hand".

Note: Even though the 'one-arm lift' aspect of the feat is heavily disputed by many strength historians including Gardinier himself, it is agreed that Bybon might have successfully cleared it off the floor and pressed it overhead with both arms, specially taking good use of the carved out handles.

The original stone is on display at the Archaeological Museum of Olympia.

References

Conor Heffernan. (January 11, 2021). "Stone Lifting in Ancient Greece: Bybon’s Stone".
Galakoutis, Chris. (2006-04-23). "Hellenic Athletes Welcomes Greek Weightlifter Giorgos Markoulas". HellenicAthletes.com.
(1925). "Olympia Its History & Remains". Oxford at the Clarendon Press.
Crowther, Nigel B.. (January 5, 2009). "Weightlifting in Antiquity: Achievement and Training".
"The collection of the olympic games (Stone offerings - L191 - The stone of Bybon)". Olympia Archaeological Museum.
"Milo of Kroton".

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::