The Collaborative International Dictionary
Discobolus \Dis*cob"o*lus\, n.; pl. Discoboli. [L., fr. Gr. ?; ? a discu + ? to throw.] (Fine Arts)
A thrower of the discus.
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A statue of an athlete holding the discus, or about to throw it.
Note: The Discobolus of Myron was a famous statue of antiquity, and several copies or imitations of it have been preserved.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
"discus thrower," from Latin, from Greek discobolos, from diskos "quoit, discus" (see disk (n.)) + -bolos "thrower," related to ballein "to throw" (see ballistics).
Wiktionary
n. 1 a discus thrower 2 a statue of a discus thrower
Wikipedia
The Discobolus of Myron (" discus thrower", , Diskobólos) is a Greek sculpture that was completed toward the end of the Severe period, circa 460–450 BC. The original Greek bronze is lost but the work is known through numerous Roman copies, both full-scale ones in marble, which was cheaper than bronze, such as the first to be recovered, the Palombara Discobolus, and smaller scaled versions in bronze.
A discus thrower is depicted about to release his throw: "by sheer intelligence", Kenneth Clark observed in The Nude, "Myron has created the enduring pattern of athletic energy. He has taken a moment of action so transitory that students of athletics still debate if it is feasible, and he has given it the completeness of a cameo." The moment thus captured in the statue is an example of rhythmos, harmony and balance. Myron is often credited with being the first sculptor to master this style. Naturally, as always in Greek athletics, the Discobolus is completely nude. His pose is said to be unnatural to a human, and today considered a rather inefficient way to throw the discus. Also there is very little emotion shown in the discus thrower's face, and "to a modern eye, it may seem that Myron's desire for perfection has made him suppress too rigorously the sense of strain in the individual muscles," Clark observes. The other trademark of Myron embodied in this sculpture is how well the body is proportioned, the symmetria.
The potential energy expressed in this sculpture's tightly wound pose, expressing the moment of stasis just before the release, is an example of the advancement of Classical sculpture from Archaic. The torso shows no muscular strain, however, even though the limbs are outflung.
Usage examples of "discobolus".
But of course it wasn't an act of love: it was a mere athletic event, two matchless discoboli moving in tandem through the prescribed and preordained rituals of their specialty, and what did love have to do with that ?
It had a certain aesthetic appeal, however, at least to someone who prefers the lean grace of early classical Greek sculptures such as the Discobolus to the muscle-bound athletes of the later Hellenistic period.
Our discussion had clarified several of my amorphous ideas, but John Donne and the Discobolus kept elbowing into my attempts at deductive reasoning.
The fish-woman of Dumarsais can hold her own with the herb-woman of Euripides, the discobolus Vejanus lives again in Forioso the rope-dancer, Therapontigonus Miles might go arm in arm with the grenadier Vadeboncœur, Damasippus the curiosity broker would be happy among the old curiosity shops, Vincennes would lay hold of Socrates just as the whole Agora would clap Diderot into a strong box.