Where wrestling originated
The Sport of wrestling was the most popular event in the Original Greek Games, and lists of Olympic wrestling winners have been recorded since 708 B.C. One of the most famous wrestlers was the philosopher, Plato, who won many prizes for wrestling as a young man. His real name was Aristocles, but because of his success, he was given the name Plato, meaning “broad shoulders”. Wrestling traces its origins back to the dawn of civilization. Carvings and drawings estimated to be between 15,000 and 20,000 years old, found in caves in Southern Europe, illustrate wrestlers in hold and leverage positions. Sumerians cast wrestlers in bold relief on stone slabs at least 5,000 years ago, antedating all other artifacts of ancient sport. A small bronze statuette of wrestlers, apparently used as a vase, was unearthed in the ruins of Khafaji, near Baghdad. This artifact, dated 2600 B.C., is now housed in the Iraqi national museum. Wrestling also reached a high stage of development in Egypt, where paintings of wrestlers dating to approximately 2500 B.C. have been found in the tombs of kings and other high officials. No excavation or historical document has depicted wrestling so completely and so technically correct as have drawings in the temple-tombs of Beni Hasan in middle kingdom Egypt.
