The Rome Games had an extraordinary impact in our Western countries. There were two reasons for this: the unique setting in which they took place and the presence of television, which, largely democratized, brought images from the Eternal City into every home. Thus, 16 centuries after an edict of the Emperor Theodosius had brought down on Olympia "the leaden screed of oblivion", Olympism was to triumph again in the very places where they had been condemned