The Olympic Oath (distinct from the Olympic creed) is a solemn promise made by one athlete, judge or official, and one coach at the Opening Ceremony of each Olympic Games. Each oath taker is from the host nation and takes the oath on behalf of all athletes, officials, or coaches at the Games. The athletes' oath was first introduced for the 1920 Summer Olympic Games, with oaths for the officials and coaches added in 1972 and 2010.

The inspiration for an oath came from the Ancient Olympic Games where competitors swore on a statue of Zeus. An oath for the athletes was first thought of in 1906, following unsportsmanlike incidents. An athletes' oath was introduced for the 1920 games and Victor Boin was the first person to take the oath on behalf of all athletes. Giuliana Minuzzo was the first woman to take the athletes' oath at the winter games in 1956, while Heidi Schuller did likewise at the Summer Olympics in 1972. The first Olympic Champion to take the oath was Rudolf Ismayr, who took it at the 1936 Games. The only occasion where more than one person has said an oath occurred at the 1988 Summer Olympics when Hur Jae and Shon Mi-Na took the athletes' oath together, until 2021 when rules around gender equality decreed that each oath would be taken by a man and a woman. The oath has changed over the years to remove nationalism and to reflect drugs in sport and equality.

An oath for the officials was first discussed in the 1950s. It was not, however, until 1970 that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) voted to include an oath of the officials as well as athletes at the Olympic Games. The first oath for the officials was taken by Fumio Asaki at the 1972 Winter Olympic Games. When the Youth Olympics were created the IOC decided to have an oath for coaches as they realised that young athletes look to them particularly. This was introduced into the adult games for the 2012 edition.

History

An oath was an idea taken from the Ancient Olympic Games where competitors swore an oath beside a statue of Zeus. A call for an oath was announced as early as 1906 by International Olympic Committee (IOC) president and founder Pierre de Coubertin in the Revue Olympique (Olympic Review in French). all the competitors took an Olympic style oath and were led by Camille Mandrillon.

In 1961, "swear" was replaced by "promise" and "the honour of our countries" by "the honour of our teams" in an effort to eliminate nationalism at the Olympic Games. women had been competing at the games since 1900. At the 1988 Games the athletes' oath for the first time was undertaken by more than one person, when Hur Jae and Shon Mi-Na took the oath in unison. The oaths are usually spoken in the language of the host nation (or athlete's mother tongue – Bojan Krizaj represented Yugoslavia but spoke Slovenian), but in 1994 both of the oaths were conducted in English rather than Norwegian.

In 1999, the IOC created the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in an effort to form a more organized battle against doping. Thus, the Athletes Oath was amended to include references to doping and drugs. In 2010 the IOC recognised that younger athletes, in particular, are influenced by their coaches. At the first Youth Olympic Games, coaches were also required to undertake an oath for this reason.

Athletes' Oath

The chosen athlete, a representative of all the participating Olympic competitors, recited the following from 2000 until 2016:

:In the name of all competitors, I promise that we shall take part in these Olympic Games, respecting and abiding by the rules which govern them, committing ourselves to a sport without doping and without drugs, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, for the glory of sport and the honor of our teams.

The Coaches' Oath

At the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics, an additional oath was taken by a coach; this was added to the protocol for the 2012 Games:

:In the name of all the coaches and other members of the athletes' entourage, I promise that we shall commit ourselves to ensuring that the spirit of sportsmanship and fair play is fully adhered to and upheld in accordance with the fundamental principles of Olympism.

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|1924 Summer Olympics||Géo André||Athletics||-||-||

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|1932 Summer Olympics||George Calnan||Fencing||-||-||

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|1984 Summer Olympics||Edwin Moses||Athletics||Sharon Weber||-||

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|2010 Winter Olympics||Hayley Wickenheiser||Ice hockey||Michel Verrault||-||

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|2012 Winter Youth Olympics||Christina Ager||||Peter Zenz||Angelika Neuner||

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|2014 Winter Olympics||Ruslan Zakharov||Short track and speed skating|| ||Anastasia Popkova||

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|2018 Winter Olympics||Mo Tae-bum||Speed skating||Kim Woo-sik||Park Ki-ho||

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|2018 Summer Youth Olympics||Teresa Romairone||||Lorena McColl||Carlos Retegui||

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| rowspan="2"|2020 Summer Olympics||Kasumi Ishikawa||Table tennis||Asumi Tsuzaki||Reika Utsugi||rowspan="2"|

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|Ryota Yamagata||Athletics||Masato Kato||Kosei Inoue

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| rowspan="2"|2022 Winter Olympics||Liu Jiayu||Snowboarding||rowspan="2"|Yongchun Tao||rowspan="2"|Ji Xiaoou||rowspan="2"|

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|Wang Qiang||Cross-country skiing

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| rowspan="2"|2024 Summer Olympics||Florent Manaudou||Swimming||rowspan="2"|Melanie Tran||rowspan="2"|Christophe Massina||rowspan="2"|

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|Mélina Robert-Michon||Athletics

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| rowspan="2"|2026 Winter Olympics||Stefania Constantini||Curling||rowspan="2"|Raffaella Locatelli<br>Gabriele Toldo||rowspan="2"|Elizabetta Biavaschi<br>Maurizio Marchetto||rowspan="2"|

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|Dominik Fischnaller||Luge

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|2026 Summer Youth Olympics||||||||||

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|2028 Summer Olympics||||||||||

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See also

  • Olympic symbols

References

  • Recording of the Olympic Oaths being taken in 2012