1. Origins

The Sumerians were some of the first humans to record their sporting activity, as wrestlers, around 3000 bc. Wrestling and other early activities appear recognizable to us as sports or forms of play, but are radically different from what we now understand as modern sport. ‘Origins’ shows that over the centuries sport has progressed from what has been described as a physical form of ritual, to the modern sporting era where tightly ruled contests rely on records and measurement. Sport history is not a simple progression from Ancient Greece to the stadia of contemporary sport, but rather a complex narrative of non-lineal changes that were constantly fractured by time and place.