Ancient Summer Games: According to the Greek mythology , Hercules, the son of Zeus , founded the ancient Summer Games . The first recorded Summer Games were held in 776 BC . The ancient Summer Games were held every four years for nearly 1200 years . The Roman emperor Theodosius I , a Christian, banned the Games in 393 AD , because of their pagan influences.
Revival of the Summer Games and Birth of the Modern Olympics: In the 17 th century , the Summer Games sports festival was held in Much Wenlock, Shropshire and England . These games were followed by the National Summer Games in the 19 th century . Later, France and Greece held similar events, but these were all small-scale events.
In the mid-nineteenth century, the ruins of ancient Olympia were excavated by German archeologists . With this incident, the interest in reviving the Olympics as an international event grew. At the same time, Baron Pierre de Coubertin , a French educationist was searching for a reason for the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 . He thought the reason behind the defeat was the lack of proper physical education among French people. After his research, he came to the conclusion that revival of the Summer Games was the only way to bring nations closer together and to make a peaceful world.
At first, Coubertin 's attempt to make the French people interested in sports was not accepted. In 1890 , Coubertin founded Union des Sociétés Francaises de Sports Athlétiques (USFSA) , a sports organization. Two years later, Coubertin first put forward his idea of reviving the Summer Games at a meeting of the Union des Sports Athlétiques in Paris on November 25, 1892 . Coubertin was not the first to suggest the revival of the Summer Games . However, he was undoubtedly the most well-connected and persistent of those to do so. In 1894 , Coubertin arranged for a conference with 79 delegates representing nine countries . At this meeting, Coubertin spoke of the revival of the Summer Games with great enthusiasm. The delegates at the conference voted unanimously for the Summer Games . On the last day of the conference, the first Modern Summer Games were decided to be held in 1896 . Athens , the birthplace of the ancient Summer Games , was chosen as the host of the first Olympics of the modern era. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was established to organize the Games. Demetrius Vikelas was elected the first president of the IOC .
The first modern Summer Games marked the staging of the largest international sports event of that time. The Greek officials and public proposed to have the monopoly to host the Summer Games like the ancient times. But Coubertin and the IOC decided to move the event all over the world. As the consequence, the second modern Summer Games were decided to be held in Paris, France
