Isthmian games [key], athletic events organized c.581 b.c. They were held at Corinth in the spring of the first and third years of the Olympiad, and they honored Palaemon as well as Poseidon. The contests were generally like the Olympic games, but they were conducted on a smaller scale; the many added amusements and the convenient journey from Athens made the Isthmian games popular. The victor's prize was a crown of wild celery, but after Corinth was destroyed (146 b.c.) by the Romans and restored (44 b.c.) by Julius Caesar, the Isthmian games were reestablished for a time with a crown of fir as the victor's prize.
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