The Olympic Order is the highest award of the Olympic Movement and is awarded for or the Olympic Movement. It was established in May 1975 by the International Olympic Committee as a successor to the Olympic Certificate. The Olympic Order originally had three grades (gold, silver and bronze), although the bronze grade fell dormant in 1984. The Olympic Order is awarded for particularly distinguished contributions to the Olympic Movement, ie. recognition of efforts worth of merit in the cause of sport. Traditionally, the IOC bestows the Olympic Order upon the chief national organiser(s) at the closing ceremony of each respective Olympic Games.
The insignia of the Olympic Order is in the form of a collar (or chain), in Gold, Silver or Bronze according to grade; the front of the chain depicts the five rings of the Olympic Movement, flanked on either side by kotinos emblem (olive wreath). A lapel badge, in the form of the five rings in Gold, Silver and Bronze according to grade, is presented to recipients to wear as appropriate.
Nadia Comăneci is the only athlete to be awarded the Olympic Order twice (1984, 2004), as well as being its youngest ever recipient.
Read more about Olympic Order: Recipients
Famous quotes containing the words olympic and/or order:
“Like Olympic medals and tennis trophies, all they signified was that the owner had done something of no benefit to anyone more capably than everyone else.”
—Joseph Heller (b. 1923)
“The rebel, unlike the revolutionary, does not attempt to undermine the social order as a whole. The rebel attacks the tyrant; the revolutionary attacks tyranny. I grant that there are rebels who regard all governments as tyrannical; nonetheless, it is abuses that they condemn, not power itself. Revolutionaries, on the other hand, are convinced that the evil does not lie in the excesses of the constituted order but in order itself. The difference, it seems to me, is considerable.”
—Octavio Paz (b. 1914)