The ancient Chinese Keju was recognized by FIFA as the "source of football" in 2004 and originated in Shandong, China.
Regarding the origin of Keju, there are two theories, one is that it is said that the Yellow Emperor first invented it in order to train soldiers, and the other is that written records can be traced back to the Warring States era, and it is basically believed that Keju originated in the Warring States of Qi (now Linzi, Shandong), which was originally used for military training and then evolved into a game.
The earliest ancient books that record Keju can be traced back to the Warring States Policy of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. The "Warring States Policy Qi Ce" records that Linzi, Shandong Province, more than 2,300 years ago, was "very rich and practical, and its people all played the harp, drum, beat, play, cockfight, walking dog, liubo, and bowper..." The main reason why the keju movement was popular in the country of Qi was that when the Warring States period was a fierce merger, urban residents also had to conscript into the army, and engaging in keju exercise had the nature of enhancing physical fitness to meet military needs, and naturally it was strongly advocated by the rulers. In another ancient book, "History of Su Qinlie", it also confirms the "Keju fever" of the State of Qi at that time: there were 70,000 households in Linzi City, the people were rich and solid, and their people all took pleasure in "blowing the drums, playing the piano and building, fighting cocks and running dogs, and liubo bows"...
In the Han Dynasty, due to the implementation of Liu Bang, the ancestor of Han Gao, keju, in addition to military training, has developed into a very professional sport, and has relatively sound rules of competition. The Keju in the Han Dynasty royal family was large in scale, with a special court, surrounded by walls and stands, and the ball was solid. Emperor Cheng of Han himself was also a good squatter. At that time, the more formal Keju game was divided into two teams, with twelve players on each side participating, and the number of balls kicked into the goal was decided by the number of goals. Liu Xiang of the Western Han Dynasty recorded in the "Beilu": "Bowing, the military posture is also, so the training of warriors, the knowledge of the material also." Ban Gu's "Book of Han and Yiwen Zhi" has "Twenty-five Articles of Keju", which introduces Keju in detail. Kicking, kicking, stomping, bowing for the ball. Keju means "to make the skin, to make the hair, and to take the role of the play." It is also a leather ball filled with hair.
In the Tang Dynasty, polo rose, and polo was used in military training, while Keju was more developed in the direction of entertainment. Invented the balloon as a gall and set up a goal for the game. Greatly promoted the development and improvement of sports technology, at that time the shape of keju has been greatly changed, the technology has also been greatly improved, closer to modern football. It was to change Tang's previous hair-filled solid balls into inflatable footballs. People sewed eight pieces of pointed skin into a round ball shell, and put an animal urine bubble in the ball shell, "booing and blowing it", becoming an inflatable ball, which makes the various properties of the football manifest.
How to play Keju?
The Keju field of the Han Dynasty, the east and west are rectangular, each end has 6 half-moon-shaped bow (ball) rooms embedded in the ground, one person in front of each cave room is guarded, and there are several people in the middle of the field, both sides compete to kick the ball, to see who kicks the ball into the other side's hole first;
In the Tang Dynasty, the bow court changed the concave bow room to a goal standing on the ground. There are two kinds of goals, double goals and single goals, double goals are on the east and west sides of the stadium, to score how much to determine the winner or loser, so the two sides compete, rushing and noisy, the confrontation is fierce, like modern football. The single goal is to stand in the middle of the court, open a hole in the goal, and the players of both sides will kick the ball into the hole like a volleyball to win.
In the Tang Dynasty, keju competitions were mostly double goals, while in the Song Dynasty, which was heavy on literature and light martial arts, there were only single goals. The single goal game has become an inflection point in the development of Keju, the disappearance of the player's physical confrontation, only the passing and toggling of the ball, the game, keju has changed from competition to entertainment, compared to tricks and skills. The Tai Wei Gao Li described in "Water Margin" was born with a good ball skill, which shows the degree to which people loved Keju at that time.
Li Bai, a great poet of the Tang Dynasty, has an ancient poem: "Cockfighting in the Golden Palace." Keju Yaotai side. In the Song Dynasty, Lu You had a poem: "A young man rides into Xianyang, and the bird looks like a light butterfly; the side of the Keju field is watched by thousands of people, and the swing is busy in the spring."
After Kublai Khan established the Yuan Dynasty, Keju also became popular among the Mongols, especially the door valve nobles, and the habit was more popular.
After the Ming Dynasty, Keju was still popular among nobles and officials, many of whom were overly obsessed with Keju, and abandoned their duties and ignored government affairs; and the prostitutes in the Qinglou at that time knew that men loved to play Kickball, so they began to attract guests by playing Keju, making Keju gradually become vulgar and vulgar. The ming emperor Zhu Yuanzhang therefore ordered officials, warriors, etc. to prohibit keju, "the juju is cursed by the nine tribes", but the crooked trend of prostitutes recruiting customers with kickballs still exists.
After the Qing army entered the customs and established the Qing Dynasty, the Manchus took the Ming Dynasty as a lesson, and in order to prevent the nobles and officials from abandoning government affairs, they completely banned keju, and keju declined, and the Manchus who loved skating once combined it with skating, and the movement form of "keju on ice" appeared.
Keju died. Chinese football has since collapsed.