Combat Sports in the Ancient World

Combat Sports in the Ancient World

Author: Michael B. Poliakoff

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 1987-01-01

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 9780300063127

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A comprehensive study of the practice of combat sports in the ancient civilizations of Greece, Rome and the Near East.


Sports and Games of the Ancients

Sports and Games of the Ancients

Author: Steve Craig

Publisher: Greenwood

Published: 2002-06

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780313361203

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Based on reports from 19th century explorers, museum artifacts, and other historical documents, the rules, equipment, and diagrams as they are currently understood are provided here for readers, along with suggestions for adapting these sports and games for modern times. Sports enthusiasts and students will find this volume a valuable resource for discovering the earliest beginnings of our modern-day sports. Divided according to seven geopolitical regions of the world, Sports and Games of the Ancients describes the sports, games, and play of our earliest ancestors. Their need for survival in often hostile conditions enable them to develop skills such as long distance running or archery, and these skills were then practiced in friendly competitions that evolved into our modern-day marathons and Olympic events. Covering such games as Africa's mancala and senet, the martial arts of Asia, the log run and Tejo of Latin America, and the boomerang and surfing of Oceania, this volume provides a solid picture of the sports and games of our ancient ancestors.


Athletics and Games of the Ancient Greeks

Athletics and Games of the Ancient Greeks

Author: Edward M. Plummer

Publisher: Good Press

Published: 2021-11-05

Total Pages: 77

ISBN-13:

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In Athletics and Games of the Ancient Greeks, Plummer examines ancient Greek exercise, Olympics, sports, and games. Edward M. Plummer was a highly accomplished ear surgeon in early 20th century Massachusetts. "Bodily exercise was not an irksome task, but an agreeable pastime. The ancient Hellenes were therefore a very happy people, the ends that they sought to attain prescribed tasks that were congenial with their national temperament."


Sport in Ancient Times

Sport in Ancient Times

Author: Nigel B. Crowther

Publisher:

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780806139951

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A lively survey encompassing the Orient, the Americas, and the classical world From the Olympic Games of Greece to the gladiatorial contests of Rome, sport in the ancient world was fiercely competitive and included a wider range of physical contests than we moderns might suspect. The early Chinese played forms of polo and golf, while half a world away, Hohokam and Maya Indians enjoyed team ball games. Nigel Crowther, a leading authority on classical Greek sport, here casts his net over the entire ancient world to reveal the variety, and often the intensity, of sport in earlier times, from 3000 b.c.e. to the Middle Ages. Taking in twenty premodern societies on five continents--with particular emphasis on ancient Greece and Rome and the Byzantine Empire--he traces connections to modern sporting attitudes, practices, and institutions as he describes how athletics figured in cultural arenas that extended beyond physical prowess to ritual, social status, military associations, and politics. Crowther takes us back to the birth of sumo wrestling in Japan and describes the sports of the Sumerians and Hittites. He documents bull leaping and boxing as recorded on pottery in Crete, as well as running and archery as practiced by the pharaohs in Egypt. He shows the significance of the early Olympic Games, describes the Romans' use of gladiatorial contests for political ends, and analyzes the influence of Byzantine chariot racing on society. He also notes the changing role of women in ancient sports--from their prominence in Egyptian contests, to the mythological Atalanta, to female Roman gladiators. As informative as it is entertaining, Sport in Ancient Times opens new vistas for general readers, students, and sport historians. It offers a broad look at ancient sport and will enrich readers' appreciation of games they enjoy today.


Ringside

Ringside

Author: Scott Beekman

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2006-06-30

Total Pages: 219

ISBN-13: 0313026785

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Despite its status as one of the oldest and most enduringly popular sports in history, wrestling has been pushed to the background of the current American sports scene. Most people today would have a hard time even considering wrestling (with some of its modern theatrics) in the same terms as track and field or boxing. But until the 1920s, wrestling stood as a legitimate professional sport in this country, and a widely practiced amateur one as well. Its past respectability may not have endured, but the advent of cable television in the 1980s offered the sport a renewed opportunity to play a determining role in American popular culture. This opportunity was not wasted, and wrestlers now assume places in politics and film at the highest levels. Ringside, the first work to fully examine the history of professional wrestling in this country, provides an illuminating and colorful account of all of the various athletes, entertainers, businessmen, and national outlooks that have determined wrestling's erratic route through American history. This chronological work begins with a brief account of wrestling's global history, and then proceeds to investigate the sport's growth as a specifically American institution. Wrestling has continued to survive in the face of technological developments, scandals, public ridicule, and a lack of centralized control, and today this supremely adaptable entertainment form represents, in sum, an international industry capable of attracting enormous television and pay-per-view audiences, along with massive amounts of advertising and merchandizing revenue. Ringside focuses on the business of wrestling as well as on the performers and their in-ring antics, and offers readers a fully nuanced examination of the development of professional wrestling in America.


Game Design Theory

Game Design Theory

Author: Keith Burgun

Publisher: CRC Press

Published: 2012-08-13

Total Pages: 190

ISBN-13: 1466554207

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Despite the proliferation of video games in the twenty-first century, the theory of game design is largely underdeveloped, leaving designers on their own to understand what games really are. Helping you produce better games, Game Design Theory: A New Philosophy for Understanding Games presents a bold new path for analyzing and designing games. The author offers a radical yet reasoned way of thinking about games and provides a holistic solution to understanding the difference between games and other types of interactive systems. He clearly details the definitions, concepts, and methods that form the fundamentals of this philosophy. He also uses the philosophy to analyze the history of games and modern trends as well as to design games. Providing a robust, useful philosophy for game design, this book gives you real answers about what games are and how they work. Through this paradigm, you will be better equipped to create fun games.


Curse of the Ancients (Infinity Ring, Book 4)

Curse of the Ancients (Infinity Ring, Book 4)

Author: Matt de la Peña

Publisher: Scholastic Inc.

Published: 2013-06-04

Total Pages: 205

ISBN-13: 0545484596

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Fix the past. Save the future. What is the secret history connecting the SQ to the Ancient Maya?Book includes an all-new, full-color Hystorian's Guide - your key to unlocking the fourth episode of the action-packed Infinity Ring game.


Weird Sports and Wacky Games around the World

Weird Sports and Wacky Games around the World

Author: Victoria R. Williams

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2015-04-28

Total Pages: 396

ISBN-13: 1610696409

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With hundreds of books dedicated to conventional sports and activities, this encyclopedia on the weirdest and wackiest games offers a fresh and entertaining read for any audience. Weird Sports and Wacky Games around the World: From Buzkashi to Zorbing focuses on what many would consider abnormal activities from across the globe. Spanning subjects that include individual games, team sports, games for men and women, and contests involving animal competitors, there is something for every reader. Whether researching a particular country or region's traditions or wanting an interesting read for pleasure, this book offers an array of uses and benefits. Though the book focuses on games and sporting activities, the examination of these topics gives readers insight into unfamiliar places and peoples through their recreation—an essential part of the human experience that occurs in all cultures. Such activities are not only embedded in everyday life but also indelibly interconnected with social customs, war, politics, commerce, education, and national identity, making the whimsical topic of the book an appealing gateway to insightful, highly relevant information.


Games for the Gods

Games for the Gods

Author: John Herrmann

Publisher: MFA Publications

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13:

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The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, proudly presents the original Olympics in all their sweaty, heroic glory. Like today, sports were a vital part of daily life in ancient Greece. "Games for the Gods" unearths the original traditions of athletics, highlighting both the fascinating similarities and the jarring differences between the ancient ways and our own. We might not be used to such Classical customs as associating athletic festivals with certain gods, seeing our athletes compete in the nude, or having them indulge in dirty fighting as accepted practice (then again...), but the excitement of competition, admiration for athletic skill, and adoration of champions--as well as several of the sports--are just as familiar to fans today as they were to the ancients. The Greek Games here come to life in a series of texts that explore the Olympics then and now, the origins of the games and various athletic events, and the ways in which the contests were prepared for and the victors honoured. With stunning illustrations of over 140 sculptures, vases, and coins, as well as photographs of modern athletes, "Games for the Gods" is a unique celebration of the Olympic spirit through the ages.