Football in the Making

Abstract

The game of football has a rich global history. Most cultures and civilisations seem to have played some kind of proto-football, involving the kicking of a ball between various groups of players. The Chinese game of CuJu was played during neolithic times. The indigenous peoples of North and Central America played ball games as part of their fertility rites. In medieval Europe, French peasants practised the violent ball game of soule; the Florentine Renaissance men performed calcio; the Scots and English played various ‘folk football’ games in towns and villages.