Ancient Sports Too Crazy for the Modern World

Mankind is driven by its innate competitive spirit. We thrive on competition, and we have cultivated our competitive streak and integrated it in our daily lives by creating a healthy and relatively safe platform for it through sports.

While modern sports have been finetuned in such a way that the possibility of getting seriously injured has significantly been reduced as time went by, it cannot be denied that these physical activities still pose some danger to those who engage in them. But that degree of danger is nothing compared to the many sports and games from our ancient past that no longer exist today. And as much as many of us enjoy a little risk in exchange for some adrenaline-fueled exhilaration, some of these ancient sports were too bloody, violent and just utterly insane by modern standards that they died out over time as they required the loss of life and limb of most of their players all for the sake of entertainment.

And so, for this video, here are eight (8) ancient sports that are just too crazy for the modern world.

#1 — Pitz

Also known as the Mesoamerican Ballgame, this sport dates back to 1400 BCE and was played by the pre-Columbian inhabitants of ancient Mesoamerica. The game is said to be similar to that of racquetball and the players’ objective was to keep a solid, heavy ball in play though vertical stone rings were introduced later on. The sport is brutal as it inflicted serious injuries on the players that left them perpetually bruised and may have possibly killed some of them. Even worse, the sport also had ritual aspects which required the human sacrifice of the losing team and the decapitation of its members, particularly the captain.

#2 — Venatio

Translated in English, this Roman sport means “The Hunt” and it was a popular form of gladiatorial combat and a source entertainment in Rome around 54 A.D. It entailed a team of slaves facing off against the “Beast of Carthage,” which equated to 20 aggressive elephants charging at the competitors at full speed. The players only had around 2% chances of surviving the whole ordeal, and needless to say, the game was very violent and resulted to the deaths of countless humans and elephants alike.

#3 — Cretan Bull Leaping

From the name itself, you could probably already tell that this coming-of-age sport from the island of Crete in Greece involved young men jumping over speeding bulls. To the ancient Cretans, successfully leaping over a bull marked a boy’s transition into manhood, but sadly, some of these boys never got to grow up as adults as their miscalculated attempts at bull leaping often led to their untimely demise. Some were lucky and survived the experience with serious injuries, but others were extremely lucky and potentially heaven-blessed since they successfully made the jump relatively unscathed.

#4 — Pankration

We credit the Ancient Greeks for many things and one of them is probably the development of what is arguably the first known mixed martial art sport on the face of the Earth - Pankration. It’s a combination of striking and wrestling and quite similar with modern-day MMA tournaments. However, this ancient Greek combat sport didn’t have weight divisions, time limits and rests in-between rounds. The rule was simple - almost anything was allowed and the fighting didn’t end until someone surrendered. Interestingly, while the fighting can be brutal and almost deadly, competitors were not allowed to kill their opponents. Doing so resulted to a loss as it meant that the other contestant had a stronger warrior spirit for refusing to quit.

#5 — Skin Pulling

Known as the Viking’s version of the game tug of war, it had the same rules as the classic sport we play today although with a few minor details that made it one of the Vikings’ favorite pastimes. First of all, the Vikings did not pull a rope; they pulled on animal hides which were tied together. And second of all, the Vikings made the game even more interesting by holding the tournaments over open pits of fire. Losing was more than just an unsavory option as the team that got dragged into the burning pit faced a very gruesome and fiery end.

#6 — Chariot Racing

If you’ve watched the 1959 film classic “Ben-Hur,” then you probably recall the iconic “chariot race” scene from the movie and saw how violent and dangerous this ancient sport could get. Chariot racing was a popular event during the thriving civilizations of the Ancient Greeks, Romans and the Byzantine Empire. Charioteers of the time were paid handsomely and enjoyed considerable fame. However, they also lived relatively short lives as chariot racing did not have strict rules to follow and contestants could do anything they wanted to prevent their opponents from finishing the race. They could ram against other chariots to destroy them and even use weapons to slaughter the horses so the other charioteers would crash.

#7 — The Fisherman’s Joust

A very popular aquatic combat sport in ancient Egypt, the Fisherman’s Joust had a simple principle: two teams on their respective boats would venture into the crocodile-infested waters of the Nile and attempt to knock off their opponents from their boats using paddles or long poles. Hitting each other senselessly could get very brutal but that wasn’t the only life-threatening situation that contestants would encounter in playing this sport. If they ended up falling into the water, they would be lucky to swim their way back to dry land but before they could, they risked getting eaten alive by the crocodiles, hippos and other beastly creatures that were lurking in the waters.

#8 — Naumachia

This ancient Roman sport in English literally means “naval combat,” and it’s essentially the staging of naval battles in which the objective of the contestants involved is to destroy the opponent’s fleet of ships and kill all of its crew, which were made up of prisoners. The competitions did not take place at open sea but were held in specially-designed man-made basins that in some cases included various sea creatures. The earliest recorded event of Naumachia was organized by Julius Caesar in 46 BC in celebration of his military accomplishments. However, the largest recorded event of this violent sport was arranged by Emperor Claudius in 52 AD and took place at Fucine Lake. This naval battle involved the participation of 100 vessels and around 19,000 men.  

We cannot deny that our ancient ancestors were capable of coming up with ingenious ways to push the limits of what the human body could achieve while entertaining themselves at the same time. But these ancient sports eventually died out with the passage of time and with good reason. In the world we live in today, we no longer welcome the idea of forcing people into participating in bloody and deadly games for the sake of mass entertainment. But that doesn’t mean we are not capable of finding fun and interesting ways to amuse ourselves. We enjoy dangerous sports too just as much as our ancestors once did, only we no longer think athletes must lose their lives and their limbs for us to deem modern sports events to be worth our while.

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SOURCES:

http://listverse.com/2014/02/06/10-ancient-sports-that-are-completely-terrifying/

http://www.cracked.com/article/180_6-ancient-sports-too-awesome-modern-world/

http://iluvesports.com/ancient-sports-too-awesome-for-the-modern-world/

http://www.themost10.com/crazy-ancient-sports/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesoamerican_ballgame

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venatio

http://www.ancient-origins.net/history-ancient-traditions/pankration-deadly-martial-art-form-ancient-greece-005221?nopaging=1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tug_of_war

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chariot_racing#Roman_era

http://healthandfitnesshistory.com/ancient-sports/egyptian-fisherman-jousting-water-jousting/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naumachia

Ancient Viking Sword Used Technology From The Future: The Ulfberht Viking Sword

The Vikings are often portrayed as crude people that should be feared, but in reality, they left behind an important legacy that has resounded throughout history. Among them are the mysterious Uflberht swords – medieval weapons of warfare which were considered to be very advanced for its time. These ancient artifacts have puzzled archaeologists for years, with many wondering about the identity of the people who made them and how the Vikings managed to forge such weapons thousands of years ahead of the technology that would have made creating them possible.

What Are Ulfberht Swords?

The Ulfberht swords are a group of medieval swords found in Europe, and are dated between the 9th and the 11th centuries. These weapons are at the transitional point between the Viking sword and the high medieval knightly sword. They are also considered to be the starting point of the high medieval tradition of inscribing sword blades.  

The blades were inlaid with the inscription of the Ulfberht name and two crosses (+VLFBERHT+), with the name “Ulfberht” believed to be a Frankish personal name that became the basis of a trademark of sorts and was also used by multiple bladesmiths for several centuries. This made the Ulfberht like a medieval luxury brand for swords, as they were of such high quality that some people consider these blades as almost mystical.

Thousands of Ulfberht swords were found across Europe, and most of them were found in rivers or were excavated from Viking burials across Europe and Scandinavia. However, only around 170 swords are proven to be authentic Ulfberht swords. They have been buried for centuries, making these found artifacts only shadows of the ancient masterpieces of weaponry that they once were.

Who Made the Ulfberht Swords?

The Ulfberht swords dominated the battlefield across different parts of Europe. These weapons were attributed to the Vikings and were used by many nations from about 800 to 1100 AD. They were only used by a few select warriors at the time as they were a masterpiece built from pure steel. After this period, the swords disappeared in Europe for at least a thousand years before weapons of this quality surfaced again around the 18th

Why these medieval swords have the inscription of Ulfberht continue to be an enigma until now as the name does not appear in written texts that existed around that time. The fact that the Ulfberht swords appear for over two hundred years is proof that they were not forged by a single craftsman. The name “Ulfberht” could have been the name of the location these weapons were produced, but it could also have been inscribed to the blades as proof of its authenticity. These premium-grade swords were so well-known in European battlefields at the time that hundreds – and maybe even thousands - of imitations of these swords were made, and even these knock-offs were of very good quality as well.

The crosses found in the inscriptions on the Ulfberht swords could suggest that these weapons have a connection with the Roman Catholic Church. This makes sense since the church dominated the Frankish Empire and was also a major producer and dealer of weapons during that time. It was also the practice by bishops and abbots to place the Greek cross before names, so it may also be possible that the Ulfberht name could have been the name of a bishop, abbot or even a monastery. However, many researchers also believe that Ulfberht was one of the most ancient trademarks, serving as sign of high quality weaponry.

Composition & Quality of the Ulfberht Swords

What makes the Ulfberht blades so special is the fact that these blades’ metal was comparable to the strength and quality of modern steel. Most Viking blades and the blades in the rest of Europe made at the time were composed of low-quality steel that could shatter like glass. This is the reason why it is such an enigma how the Ulfberht swords were so advanced when medieval blacksmiths in Europe have yet to possess the knowledge and technology to make weapons as strong, as light and as flexible as the blades that were widely made and could only have existed several centuries later.

To create a sword in the same quality as the Ulfberht blades, the inclusion and distribution of carbon is key. If a sword’s carbon content is not controlled to just the right amount, the sword will either be too soft or too brittle. However, with just the right amount of carbon, this element can significantly strengthen the blade. In fact, the carbon content of Ulfberht swords is about three times higher than that of the bladed weapons around the same time.

Also, in the process of forging iron, the ore has to be liquefied so that the blacksmith could remove the metal’s impurities known as “slag.” To make the ore’s liquefication possible, it must be heated to 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit, which is what is done in modern times. However, what’s interesting about this is that medieval blacksmiths in Europe could not make slag-free steel because their fires were not hot enough to completely liquefy the iron. Instead, in the Viking era, carbon could mainly be introduced through coal in the fire, and the only way to remove the slag from the metal was to just try to hammer out the impurities with every strike.

Theories About the Origins of the Ulfberht Swords

According to the research of Dr. Alan Williams, a consultant archaeometallurgist at the Wallace Collection, who analyzed the Ulfberht swords, the metal used in these ancient weapons is known today as crucible steel. Crucible steel is created by meting iron along with other materials mixed in a crucible and then pouring that molten metal into a mold.

At the time that the Ulfbehrt swords were produced, no one in Europe knew how to melt iron at extreme temperatures for centuries. Crucible steel was not even around the continent until the Industrial Revolution in the 18th century. So, how did the Vikings manage to forge blades that required this advanced technology around a thousand years earlier?

The Vikings were not just excellent and fearless warriors, they were also advanced in a lot of ways so much so that they were also known to be highly skilled traders and navigators. Many artifacts discovered in modern-day Scandinavia have originated from Asia, India and several Eastern parts of the world, which led many experts to believe that the Vikings have managed to somehow reach continents as distant as the Americas and Asia.

Asia was home to the greatest swordsmiths who forged the greatest swords in human history, and one of them incudes the Damascus steel, which was determined to have similar compositions to the metal content of the Ulfberht swords. This has led to one theory that the Ulfberht swords originated from modern-day Iran. Researchers suggest that the Viking acquired the materials they needed to make the Ulfberht swords by trading with merchants back when the Volga Trade route was opened around the same time.

However, another theory suggests that the Ulfberht blades had nothing to do with the steel forged in the Middle East. According to Robert Lehmann, a chemist at the Institute for Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Hannover, the material of the Ulfberht sword they found in 2012 in the Weser River in northwestern Germany does not come from the East. The sword’s blade has a high manganese content while its guard was made from iron with a high arsenic content, both of which suggest that the materials used to make the sword were European in origin. Lehmann traced the origin of the sword to a site in the Taunus region, located north of Frankfurt, Germany – a region where some monasteries were known to have created weapons at the time. It is important to note, however, that the Ulfberht name has not been found in the records of these weapon-making monasteries in the area.

While we may have taken several steps closer to unraveling the mystery behind the Ulfberht swords, it is still a glaring fact that we do not have all the knowledge there is to know about this ancient artifact from the Vikings. Nevertheless, we can say for certain that the Ulfberht swords are important testaments to the legacy that the Vikings have left behind as fearless warriors and as a military force to be reckoned with during what has become known as the Viking age. These special swords also serve as proof of the painstaking lengths taken by great swordsmiths of the time to forge weapons of impressive quality that even modern swordsmiths admit to be a very complicated task though they possess the knowledge and technology that weapon makers of the Viking era did not.

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Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulfberht_swords
http://www.ancient-origins.net/artifacts-ancient-technology/step-closer-mysterious-origin-viking-sword-ulfberht-002455?nopaging=1
http://www.ancientpages.com/2014/02/11/unravelling-mystery-ulfberht-sword-ancient-viking-artifact-far-ahead-time/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2878512/The-mystery-magical-superstrong-Viking-sword-Researchers-close-supermonks-believed-forged-weapons.html
http://ancientexplorers.com/blog/ulfberht-the-sword-made-with-tech-from-the-future/
http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1134288-a-step-closer-to-the-mysterious-origin-of-the-viking-sword-ulfberht/
http://www.hexapolis.com/2015/05/11/the-curious-case-of-ulfberht-the-viking-sword-with-seemingly-futuristic-technology/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikings