Sport And Spectacle in the Ancient World

This work by a well-published scholar and award-winning teacher provides an introduction to the history of sport and spectacle in the ancient world from the Ancient Near East through Greek and Hellenistic times and into the Roman Empire. The book introduces readers to ancient sport history as a growing and exciting field in which scholarly advances and controversies abound. Drawing on archaeological and art historical evidence and on approaches from anthropology and social history, the author goes beyond the traditional focus on the Greek Olympics and the Roman Colosseum to examine the origins, nature and meaning of sport, the sporting activities and spectacles of earlier Mediterranean peoples, local sport and unusual contests, and much more.

Donald G. Kyle is Professor and Chair of History at the University of Texas at Arlington. An award-winning teacher, he has been honoured by the University as a Distinguished Teaching Fellow. He has published Athletics in Ancient Athens (Revised Edition, 1993) and Spectacles of Death in Ancient Rome (1998) and co-edited Essays on Sport History and Sport Mythology (1990). He has appeared in History Channel shows on gladiators (1996) and crime in Rome (2005) and PBS and History Channel shows on the Ancient Olympics (2004).