{"id":2262,"date":"2024-05-25T12:51:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-25T19:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/?p=2262"},"modified":"2025-06-25T11:07:25","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T18:07:25","slug":"nautical-terminator-corinthian-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/general\/nautical-terminator-corinthian-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Nautical Terminator – Corinthian (Part 1)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In sailing, the word \u201cCorinthian\u201d refers to the non-professional arm of the sport. Sailors compete for the love of it, not for any monetary reward. At some levels of racing, this distinction is strictly enforced according to rules of the International Sailing Federation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          But in\nthe nineteenth century, sailboat racing operated like horseracing today. The\nactual sailing was left to professionals, while owners ashore wagered over gin\nand tonics. Part of this was based on the complexity of the boats and the skill\nand physical strength required to sail them. However, there was also a class\ndistinction. The requisite experience would not have been gained by the\ncomfortable progeny of the moneyed class, but by the working folks who earned\ntheir livings at sea. As a result, those who actually did the sailing and\nearned the honors lacked the proper social standing to be members, or even\nguests, of the host yacht club.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

          In\n1871, a group of sailors began a new tradition of \u201cCorinthian\u201d racing when they\nfounded the Seawanhaka Yacht Club in New York. Owners would sail their own\nboats, without professional crew. These radical sailors took pride in their\nhard-earned yet amateur knowledge of the arts of the sea. But why did they call\nthemselves Corinthians? The ancient tradition considers Corinthians to be\ndegenerates, not amateur athletes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

          There\nwere four main games in ancient Greece: the Olympian, Nemean, Pythian, and\nIsthmian games, the latter held at Corinth. None included sailing events. In\nall the games, the athletes competed naked, but fortunately this tradition\nhasn\u2019t been adopted by modern Corinthians. All were amateur in this respect:\nThe victors received wreaths, not monetary prizes. However, both Plutarch and\nPlato report that the athletes\u2019 home cities lavished awards of significant\nvalue on their champions, so the word \u201camateur\u201d isn\u2019t quite accurate. In any\ncase, I have found nothing to distinguish the games at Corinth from the others with\nrespect to amateurism. Yet the websites of the most eminent \u201cCorinthian\u201d yacht\nclubs trace the tradition back to this city. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

          I think\nthe real story is a little different. I certainly wouldn\u2019t wish to suggest that\nthe term was made up by a PR firm, as was the case with Ricardo Montalban\u2019s \u201cFine\nCorinthian Leather\u201d which was concocted for Chrysler. Yet there must be a more\nconvincing explanation for the use of the term, and we\u2019ll attempt to configure\none next time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In sailing, the word \u201cCorinthian\u201d refers to the non-professional arm of the sport. Sailors compete for the love of it, not for any monetary reward. At some levels of racing, this distinction is strictly enforced according to rules of the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,31],"tags":[68,44,61],"class_list":["post-2262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-nautical-terminator","tag-history","tag-sailing","tag-sailing-trivia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2262"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3570,"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262\/revisions\/3570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tradewindssailing.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}