Greek and Roman Sports

classic and roman Sports antiquated Hellenic and Roman civilization make up made many contributions to westerly civilization. Especially when it comes to politics, trade, and sports. From wrestling to javelin, ancient sports set the pace for some of the sports we see in our day and age, especially the exceeding Games. In old-fashioned Grecian and Romans sports, athletes contested very hard and it was a public display that was a trait of the religious and social life of ancient Greece and Rome (Osborne 15). Ancient athletes trained and participated for physical exercise, competition, and to honor their gods. In this paper I go away discuss the Greek and Roman attitudes toward sports.The ancient competition, physically, was relatively different from the sportsmanlike events we have now a days. There were far fewer events and alone free Greek men (and sometimes boys) were allowed to compete because of the barbaricity. Also, there werent any team sports every sport was one ma n against other/others, because they were more concerned about individual merit. Some of the different sports the Greeks participated in where javelin, running (with and without armor), and discuss. Moreover, some of the more brutal sports they embarked on where wrestling, boxing, and pankration (a form of wrestling and boxing). Some of the games where brutal and you had to participate naked, but it intend on showing the beauty of the tender body. The four main cycles of games were the Olympic Games, the Pythian Games, the Isthmian Games, and the Nemean Games (Kyle 48).Romans on the other hand based their sports around unpeaceful displays, most notably the fights amongst gladiators. They included a gladiatorial combat, stage-plays, chariot races, acrobatic competitions, and a mock naval battle. Without a inquiry, the Greek games depended for their entertainment think of primarily on rivalry among athletes while the Roman games were often string by the staging of battles fough t to the death and involved large numbers of human beings and also beasts (Kyle 184). The Roman sporting events I think were more brutal especially when it comes to the fights amongst gladiators when most of the time they fought to their death. While on the other hand, the Greeks were involved with the sports and the Romans simply watched them and cheered for the participant they cherished to win.In conclusion, the Greek and Roman sports helped create some of the sporting events we have today and definitely started athletic competition. We can clearly see the making love for sports in Greek and the Romans. We learn that the ancient Greeks and Romans shaped their own vagary about the meaning of life. The Roman games were radically different from the Greek games in several respects. However, their sports show the mindset of the people of that time. The Greeks were more interested in showing off the human body while the Romans were more inclined on massacring the human body. I think this shows that compared to the Romans, the Greeks valued human life more. Without a doubt modern Americans would find much of these sports awfully violent particularly the hundreds of gladiator fights and animal fights, with their many public deaths of both people and animals.Works CitedOsborne, redbreast Studies in Ancient Greek and Roman Society. New York Cambridge University Press, 2004.Kyle, Donald G. Sport and Spectacle in the Ancient World. New York Blackwell Pub, 2007.