Welcome to Robert Dover's Cotswold Olimpick Games
Chronologically, these ancient games sit almost exactly between the end of the ancient original Greek Olympics and the modern Olympic Games begun in 1896. 2020 will celebrate our 408th anniversary and the games are still held in the arena that bears the founder's name - Dover's Hill. It now also marks the end of festival season in Chipping Campden, following hot on the heels of the International Music Festival and the Literary Festival. If you're heading here on holiday, you might as well make a weekend of it and stay for Scuttlebrook Wake on the Saturday too. Follow us to stay in the loop about next year's games.
Photo Gallery from the 2019 Games,
~ the 407th Anniversary ~
The Castle is Built a Week Before the Games
Watch the video of The Games
Videos courtesy of Andrew Duke 2018
"...Events come and go; the novelty passes. But Robert Dover's Games continue to attract crowds to Dover's Hill on a late May or early June evening. One may ask why and offer emotional reasons - The setting has its romantic qualities. The sound of a band, particularly a pipe band, echoing across a hillside can be haunting. Bearing a torch aloft can evoke the past. Combine all three elements in the procession from the hillside as darkness falls and one can feel part of the agelessness of ways in which people have always enjoyed themselves."
Dr Francis Burns - A life-long friend to and scholar of The Games
.jpg)