comment on the special appropriateness of athletics to praise poetry, illustrated by Pindar’s claim that epinician praise poetry had existed even before epic: the Seven against Thebes are represented as having engaged in an athletic contest specifically before they embarked on their famous war; this athletic contest, serving as prototype for the Nemean Games, would have been celebrated by the prototype of Pindar’s current Nemean Ode in honor of the current victor at the Nemean Games