The Victor's Crown: A History Of Ancient Sport ... _TOP_
The book is divided into thirty short chapters and follows a loose chronological and thematic order in which the author highlights recurring themes and important shifts in the history of Greco-Roman sport. Part 1 probes the early origins of Greek sport in the Bronze Age and the Homeric Epics. The author follows recent scholarship in interpreting the evidence for Greek Bronze age sport in the context of palace-controlled ceremonials. Athletic contests in the Homeric epics are perceived largely as a transitional stage towards the world of institutionalized, periodic athletic contests of archaic Greece.
The Victor's Crown: A History of Ancient Sport ...
The Journal of Sport History is published three times a year in spring, summer, and fall by the North American Society for Sport History. The purpose of the North American Society for Sport History is to promote, stimulate, and encourage study and research and writing of the history of sport, and to support and cooperate with local, national, and international organizations having the same purposes. The Society conducts its activities solely for scholarly and literary purposes and not for pecuniary profit.
These fans are not in Green Bay, East Lansing, Philadelphia or Madison. They are in Constantinople, capital of the Roman Empire in 500 AD. They are going to watch chariot races. Some of them will have buried curse tablets around the track asking the demons of the underworld to wreck opposing teams. Others would have been slipping around the stables to sniff horse manure to gauge how teams were going to do. One fan would be so distraught when a famous driver died that he would throw himself on to the funeral pyre! Whole sections of a city would back one team or another, and ancient sports bars provided spots where fans met their heroes.
The currently accepted rules of ancient Greek boxing are based on historical references and images. Although there is some evidence of kicks in ancient Greek boxing,[9][10][11] this is the subject of debate among scholars.[12][13] Because of the few intact sources and references to the sport, the rules can only be inferred.[14]
In the days of the ancient Greeks, poetry and sport went hand in hand at athletic festivals like the Olympics. Poets sang the praises of athletic champions and, at some festivals, even competed in official events, reciting or playing the lyre. Here at NPR, we're reviving that tradition with our own Poetry Games.
It shows how the rise of the Roman Empire transformed the sporting world by popularizing new forms of entertainment (chiefly chariot racing, gladiatorial combat and beast hunts). David Potter vividly brings to life the experiences of being fan and competitor, and extrapolates skilfully to the modern day, creating not just a history of ancient sport, but also an examination of the social and cultural roles sport has played throughout history.
What is Sport and why do we love it? These two questions drive David Potter's analysis of the western tradition of competitive athletics from eighth century BC to the sixth century AD. The story of ancient sport offers a paradigm for the tale of sport in our own time. Incorporating the latest research, The Victor's Crown opens with an analysis of the way competitive sport emerged in Greece during the eighth century BC, and then how the great festival cycle of Classical Greece came into being during the sixth century BC. Special attention is paid to the experience of spectators and athletes, especially in the violent sports of boxing, wrestling and pancration. We meet the great athletes of the past and discover what it was that made them so great. The rise of the Roman Empire transformed the sporting world by popularizing new forms of entertainment (chiefly a specialized form of chariot racing, gladiatorial combat and beast hunts). Potter shows us what it was like to be a fan and a competitor, and how to fight like a gladiator. The Victor's Crown looks at the physiology of conditioning, ancient training techniques and the role of sport in education. The Roman government promoted and organized sport as a central feature of the Roman Empire, as sports provided common cultural currency to the diverse inhabitants of this vast empire. The Victor's Crown is not just a history of ancient sport, but also an examination of role sport has played throughout history.
For the first 12 Olympics the stadion foot-race was the only event and it remained the most prestigious event throughout the history of the Games. The race was ran over one length (a stadion) of the stadium track, 600 ancient feet or 192 m and preliminary heats were held with heat winners going into the final. Athletes were grouped by lot and in the interest of fairness this was also the way pairings were matched in the other events. The eventual winner of the stadion would even give his name to that particular Games and so be remembered for all time.
The emphasis in this course is on the close reading of primary sources in discussion sections of about 25 students. The lectures help students make the connection between text and context. Our subject is broad: in History 141 we examine the political, social and cultural history of western civilization from antiquity to 1660. We will be reading primary sources from the ancient, medieval, and early modern periods, including the medieval heroic epic Beowulf (written c. 750), The Treasure of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pizan (1365-c.1429), and The Prince of Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527).
This seminar-size class will explore how historians have described and studied the lives of children in the past. This is a challenge, because children, by nature and circumstances, leave little direct evidence of their thoughts and actions. The course will approach this topic through the history of the family and work, the requirements of religion, law, and government, and, wherever possible, records constructed from the perspective of children themselves. Examples will range from ancient Western societies to the twentieth-century United States.
The integration of U.S. professional baseball has been hailed an important precedent for the Civil Rights Movement. In addition to its impact on U.S. society as whole, historians and other scholars have debated the impact that integration had on Black communities and specifically on the race institutions formed during Jim Crow segregation. This course will revisit debates about baseball integration as a microcosm of broader societal issues. We will consider integration as a process that was neither a guaranteed success nor an inevitable. Course readings will revisit primary source materials that discuss the different actors and communities that campaigned for or against integration as the process unfolded. Assigned materials will offer different interpretations about the actors and their motivations in either supporting or opposing integration. In so doing, we will analyze questions of historical interpretations: How do historians use evidence to build an argument? How do we place historical scholarship in conversation with one another? We will also explore what are the possibilities and limitations of using sport, specifically baseball, as the medium to analyze questions such as integration and racial equality. Finally, this class is intended for majors who are ready to think critically about history. It will be taught in a discussion-based format, with a heavy emphasis on student participation. Assignments will include presentations, short reaction papers, and an end of the semester project.
This course takes a cultural approach to ideas of major Chinese thinkers from Confucius to Mao Zedong. We will begin with those who belong to the major schools of thought in ancient China: Confucianism, Daoism, and Legalism. These intellectual and religious traditions will be examined in terms of their genealogy in their respective historical context, paying special attention to their relationship with power in its various forms: social, political, symbolic, and institutional. Contrary to stereotypical accounts, Chinese thought has never ceased to evolve in response to both internal as well as external challenges. Over its long history, Chinese thought often engaged in dialogue with alien cultures. Through complex processes of integration, negotiation, and resistance, Chinese thought, like other aspects of Chinese culture, has continued to expand its horizon. Attention will be given to the impact of contact with foreign intellectual currents on Chinese thought from Buddhism and Christianity in the imperial period to science, individualism, liberalism, democratic theories and Marxism in modern times. Background of Chinese history is not required.
Peter Conway, a National League pitcher, was selected to supervise training in 1891, thus becoming the first hired coach. He was followed by F. J. Sexton in 1896, C. F. Watkins in 1897, and "Skel" Roach in 1903. Jerry Utley ('03e), an outstanding pitcher for Michigan, coached in 1904; he was followed by L. W. McAllister, in 1905, and R. L. Lowe in 1907. Wesley Branch Rickey ('11l), who became a major figure in the professional baseball scene, took charge as coach in 1910. One of his players was George Sisler ('15e), who captained the 1915 team and later became one of the greatest first basemen in the history of the sport. Rickey was followed by Carl Lundgren (1914-20), and he, in turn, was succeeded in 1921 by Ray Lyle Fisher (Middlebury '10), who had concluded a major league career as pitcher, first for the old New York Highlanders, forerunner of the modern Yankees, and then as hurler for the Cincinnati Reds, later accepting the position of Supervisor in Physical Education and Baseball Coach, which he still holds at Michigan. Fisher's record at Michigan is one of the most remarkable in collegiate baseball, his teams winning or sharing the Conference championship fifteen times. During his term of service no other coach or institution has equaled this record. Six titles were earned during his first twenty years and nine since 1941. 041b061a72