Dispute Over Olympics Medal Design

S Y D N E Y, Aug. 21 -- — A dispute has broken out in Australiaover an embarrassing design on the medals for next month’sSydney Olympics which depict a Roman colosseum rather than aGreek temple.

Australia’s Greek language newspaper O Kosmos described themedal design as “The Ultimate Ignorance” and demanded Athensshould not repeat the mistake at the Summer Olympics in 2004.

“The colosseum is a stadium of blood. It has nothing to dowith the Olympic ideals of peace and brotherhood,” O Kosmoseditor George Hadjivassilis told Reuters.

No Opera House

“We realize it is too late and too expensive to change themedals now but the mistake must never be repeated.” Greece wasthe home of the ancient Olympic games.

Sydney Games organizers blamed the International OlympicCommittee (IOC), saying it vetoed plans to put the city’s OperaHouse on the medals and instead ordered a “generic colosseum” asbackground.

They said the IOC advised that the traditional colosseumdesign they wanted should be derived from a 1928 medal byItalian sculpture Guiseppe Cassioli for the Amsterdam Games.

The officials said the design is a generic colosseum, notthe famous Roman one.

But Wojciech Pietranik, who designed the Sydney medals, toldthe Australian newspaper he used the Roman Colosseum as a model.

“It was supposed to show Nike, the Goddess of Victory,visiting Sydney [depicted by the Opera House] … but there wasa change because of the rules,” Pietranik said.

‘Clearly the Colosseum’

The newspaper quoted Australian history professors as sayingthe Sydney medals were clearly of the Roman Colosseum.

“Just because they made a mistake in 1928 and Greece eitherdidn’t spot it or ignored it then isn’t a reason to keeprepeating it,” Hadjivassilis said.