Sacred Games (43 page)

Stadion
. No prizes for guessing this one. It means stadium. What’s less well known is that stadion was originally a unit of length. The sports field at Olympia is one stadion long, hence its name. The sprint event at the Sacred Games was also called the stadion, since competitors ran one length of the field. The Olympic stadion is in the top right-hand corner of the map, and it’s a lot smaller than you’d think, considering its vast reputation.

Strigil
. A curved piece of bronze with a handle at one end, used to scrape down the skin. Classical Greece has soap, but no one wants to use it because it’s made of goat fat and ashes. Instead, a slave rubs you down with olive oil, and then scrapes away the dirty oil and the dead outer layer of your skin with a strigil.

Taraxippus
. The horse terror.
Tara
—terror.
Xippus
—horse. I know it’s usually
hippos
for horse, but they haven’t yet invented the dictionary and standardized spelling. The taraxippus was an altar outside the first turn of the chariot race track at the
hippodrome
. Most crashes occurred on that turn, supposedly because a
psyche
trapped within the taraxippus induced great fear in the horses.

Temple of Zeus
. The Temple of Zeus at Olympia is brand spanking new at the time of this story. It stunned the Greeks with its brilliance and was the greatest ever example of Doric architecture. The Temple of Zeus won’t be completed for another three years, but it surely must have been open for inspection at these Olympics. The cult statue will not be installed for another thirty years. When it is, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia will become one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

T
HAT THIS BOOK
exists is thanks to the endless support from my wife, Helen, and my daughters, Catriona and Megan. Helen is my first reader, and also the last before each book releases, since she reads the final proofs with exquisite care. Sometimes I open a manuscript file to find that Catriona has been reading through it, which I know because of the notes left behind in red, telling me what I did wrong, how to fix it, and with firm instructions on the fate of her favorite characters. More often than not, I take her advice.

Janet Reid is my amazing literary agent. People who aren’t involved in the process don’t quite understand how difficult a job agenting can be. How Janet manages to remain sane I don’t quite understand.

Juliet Grames is my patient editor at Soho Press. She’s astoundingly thorough! Thanks to her editing, I understand my own writing better than ever before.

Anneke Klein and Bill Kirton read early versions of
Sacred Games
, as they have every book I’ve ever written. As always, they provided invaluable comments.

And finally, a big thank-you to you! Every time I receive fan mail, or see a reader review online, I know a book that I’ve written has touched someone enough that they took the time to say something about it, which is very cool indeed.