Competitive sports originated in ancient Greece.
Sports competition in ancient Greece had its roots in funeral culture – the funeral of heroes.
This statement is verified in Homer's Epic, the earliest Greek document.
Homer's Epic shows us the social situation in Greece from the 12th century BC to the 9th century BC, a period known as the "Homeric Age".
Homer's time is an era of heroes, and the greatest heroes recorded in the epic are the descendants of God, man fights with God, and God is on earth. The gods overlook the world and intervene immediately if their interests are violated.
Most heroes are kings or nobles, and funerals after the death of kings and nobles are often gatherings of living heroes.
At the funeral ceremony, they have to compete and carry out almost real combat, generally seven or eight sports, which is the germ of Greek sports competition.
The epic records that after the death of Oedipus, king of Thebae, Eurulos' father won the boxing match at the king's funeral.
When Nestor was young and vigorous, he also participated in the funeral competition of King Amarenchus of Epea, and won boxing, wrestling, running, and gun matches, but his unfortunate defeat in the chariot race disappointed him.
In the funeral tournament of Patroclus, Achilles set 8 competitions for him: chariot race, boxing, wrestling, running, armed fighting, discus throwing, archery, bidding gun, and different prizes.
Achilles, with his warships, loaded the prizes of the competition, including cauldrons, three-legged dings, horses, mules, and strong oxen with thick necks, together with beautiful women with girdles and gray iron, in addition to gold, jars, wine glasses, jars, armor (shields, helmets, swords, axes, throwers), pig iron, etc., were also distributed as competition prizes.
When the Greek hero Achilles held the funeral of his friend Patroclus in Troy, he held a competition for heroes of the Greek allies and set up prizes for each event. The events consisted of a horse-drawn chariot race, and Diomedes won the championship and won great prizes, a dexterous slave girl and a triangular cup.
Another event is boxing, with the final played between Epeos and Eurialos. The latter came from a family of boxers, and his father, Mekestios, had participated in the funeral games of King Oedipus and defeated all Theban boxers to win the championship.
The third match was wrestling, by Ayax vs Odysseus, after two rounds, still unable to divide the winner and loser, Achilles ruled it a draw, neither of them had any objections, so they shared the prizes of the champion and runner-up. Other events include running, discus throwing, archery and bidding guns.
In Homer's time, such sports competitions also had a distinctly military overtone, especially races of horse-drawn chariots. At the funeral games of Patroclus, there was also a completely military competition, the heavily armed duel. Volunteering for the race were Ayax and Diomedes, who won as a result.
In Book 24 of the Odyssey, the funeral of the goddess Thetis for her son is mentioned: "In honor of Achilles, the Greeks held a grand funeral competition. The first thing to start is a wrestling competition. Ajax and Diomedes led the way and competed evenly. This was followed by boxing competitions, and later running competitions, archery competitions, discus throwing, long jump, chariot competitions, etc."
In the funeral tournament of Patroclus, the athletes are kings, nobles, chiefs, heroes, kings and chiefs, all warriors honed in war. It is synonymous with speed, strength, courage and robustness. In this competition, a total of 13 heroes participated in 8 competitive events, and 22 places appeared. According to the second volume of the Ship Table, there were a total of "29 teams of men, 164 regions and 16 tribes, 46 generals, 1186 warships, and a total strength of 140,000 men from all over Greece, which formed the nature and scale of the athletic competition."
Polytheistic worship was one of the characteristics of ancient Greek civilization, and the gods always liked to participate in earthly affairs and played a unique role in sports competitions. Poseidon is the god of water, horse god, and loves horse racing; Hermes is the god of business travel and the protector of sports competition; Apollo excelled in archery, boxing, and music; Achilles is synonymous with quick feet, good at running; Perseus loved to throw discus; Polydius is the king of boxing; Peleus is a master wrestler; Hercules used arrows to rescue Prometheus, who brought fire to earth, and the Greeks began a torch relay race. The above examples reveal the intimacy between sports and the gods, and the gods love sports, so people can only do what they like and gain a sense of divinity in communicating with the gods in sports competition.
In ancient Greece, heroes were descendants of gods. Heroes are the protagonists of society, people admire heroes, heroes fight for honor, and die for honor. War is the first choice for heroes to win honor, followed by funeral competitions. Large-scale funeral competitions gradually formed fixed events, athletes' identities, referee systems, award ceremonies, and later Olympic sports activities.