What does the Paris 2024 Olympics mascot represent?

The Olympics are about to begin of Paris 2024 and you may have come across a curious red mascot (with white and blue accents, recreating the colours of the French flag) with a triangular shape in two versions, Olympic and Paralympic, with the Paris 2024 logo on the chest. But what does it represent, and why was it chosen? Despite its bizarre, vaguely conical shape, it is a symbolic choice: the mascot “Olympic Phrygia” (And “Paralympic Phryge” for the Paralympic counterpart) in fact replicates the stylised shape of the traditional Phrygian headdresseshats chosen as a symbol of freedom and as an allegorical representation of the French Republic. But what is their history, and why do they symbolize freedom?

Phrygian caps owe their name to a region of Asia Minor, Phrygia (in present-day Turkey), where they were used by priests of the cult of the Sun. Adopted by the soldiers of the Persian army, later, in theAncient Romewas given by the master to freed slaves, the liberti, which is why it is believed that it began to symbolize freedom.

But when did it become a symbol of the French Republic? During the French Revolution (1789-99), when this cap first became the symbol of the Jacobins, and shortly after was adopted as symbol of the Revolution itself: this is why the emblem of France appears on Marianne’s head in the famous painting Liberty Leading the People by Eugène Delacroix.

The French are very used to seeing these hats, not only because they have a copy of the Marianne in every town hall, but also because They appear on many everyday objectssuch as coins and stamps. The “Olympic Phrygia” takes up in its two variants, Olympic and Paralympic, the shape and lines of these headdresses: their meaning is intended to enhance the vision of the Paris 2024 Olympics, according to which “sport can change your life”, and therefore in a certain sense these mascots play an important role “leading a revolution through sport“. In addition to the typical red of the cap, the mascot also features details in blue and white (such as the “cockade” eyes), thus composing the chromatic triad of the tricolor French.