Let the Games Begin!

The Olympic Games are over, and there's a bit of a void now for me. I really enjoyed the Games. Some sports I enjoy more than others, but once the various competitions are on, you can't help get into the spirit of the thing. One of my favorites was the Marathon, not only for its long-distance challenge, but the tour of London along the way! Brilliant!

This morning, I decided to look up sports in the 18th Century. I found that cricket and horse-racing go way back, actually to the 1600's, but what was very interesting, and new to me, were the Cotswold Olimpick Games, an annual public demonstration of sport etablished in 1612. They actually have continued to present day, but back in the day, they were organized by Robert Dover, with the approval of King James. They continued quite awhile, and then, as things generally go without great supervision and order, became a free-for-all of sorts, with drunk and disorderly conduct. They were disbanded, reinstiuted in the latter 1600's for a bit, then once again in the 1700's.

In 1719, James Figg became the first bare-knuckle boxing champion in England. By the 1700's, the Games included horse-back riding, running, jumping, dancing, sledge-hammer throwing, sword-fighting and wrestling. Also, booths were set up for games of chess and cards! The Games were thought to promote health, and physical exercise deemed necessary to defend the Kingdom. It was also thought it was a chance for rich and poor to mingle in "social harmony". They took place on Dover's Hill, in Chipping Campden in Gloucestershire. There was food aplenty for the gentry, and yellow ribbons pinned to hats or worn around arms, legs or neck for decoration.

                                                                                                                                                   The poet Nicholas Wallington wrote that:                                                                                                                                         He [Dover] spares no cost; this also doth afford
To those that sit at any board.
None ever hungry from these Games come home,
Or e'er made plaint of viands, or of room.^[

By 1740, the Games were known as Dover's Meeting, with wrestling contests where competitors wore heavily-nailed boots and employed shin-kicking into the sport. Ouch! By 1750, women were enrolled in a horse race. The Games were performed over a long weekend.

I have followed sports since I was a small child, sitting with my Dad in front of the television, or in a stadium, to watch a World Series, a Super Bowl, a Wimbledon Championship, and of course, the Olympics. I always remember my Dad, a consumate sports-lover, saying that "Sports are truth in motion!" And it's true, they take place where it can be anybody's day to shine. You never know the outcome until it happens, and then you celebrate a bit, but when it's over, it's over. You realize it was the getting there that holds the real excitement!

And so I look forward now to Sochi and the Winter Olympics 2014. May they be as satisfying as the London Games.