Olympians

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Athletes representing their nations at the Olympic Games across numerous sporting events are commonly referred to as competitors in this prestigious international competition
2. Those who engage in the Olympic Games embody athleticism and national pride through their participation in diverse sporting disciplines
3. Individuals who participate in the global Olympic competition representing their countries in various sports

Etymology: The plural "olympians" is simply the plural of "Olympian," and the original sense is geographical: a person from or connected to a mountain. The Greek "Ólumpos" named Mount Olympus, the mountain where, in Greek myth, the gods lived, and "Olumpios" meant "of or pertaining to" that mountain, or "living on" it, and was used specifically for Zeus. The Greek adjective became Latin "Olympius," and the English word entered through Late Middle English as "Olympyan," long before the modern sporting sense existed. The sporting association comes from the town of Olympia in ancient Elis, where the original Olympic Games were held. Late Latin "Olympianus," meaning "Olympic," was formed from "Olympia" with the Latin suffix "-anus," and that link to the games is what lets the word describe athletes today. The sense of athletes as "Olympians" thus grows out of a place-name rather than from the mountain directly. In the United States, the name has a separate, unrelated-looking history: the city of Olympia, Washington, was named after the Olympic Mountains, which were in turn named after Mount Olympus in Greece, so a resident of that city is also called an Olympian.