History of Professional Wrestling - Origin

Origin

Professional wrestling, defined as wrestling between two professionals for payment, is a form of entertainment through staged fighting—i.e. pre-determined winners and losers act as if they are taking part in a real wrestling competition to entertain an audience. There is perhaps no sport more widely dispersed or older than wrestling; it has documented history in ancient Babylonian and Egyptian art from 3000 BC, literary presence in the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh, and has been known and practiced in ancient Persian, Chinese and Japanese civilizations. The Greeks are credited for popularizing it as a competitive, widely practiced public spectacle of competitive athleticism in the Ancient Olympic Games. It has therefore been believed that the form of wrestling practiced through the ages, from the ancients onto the 19th century, has been what is now called the Greco-Roman style.

The modern style of professional wrestling, popularized by the United States and United Kingdom during the late 19th century, is called the catch-as-catch can style. Originally thought of as unorthodox and more lax in style, catch wrestling differs from Greco-Roman in its allowed grapples; Greco-Roman strictly prohibits grabbing below the waist, while catch wrestling allows holds above and below the waist, including leg grips. Both catch wrestling and Greco-Roman were popular and completely legitimate amateur and professional sports. But, from the late 19th century onwards, a sub-section of catch wrestling changed slowly into the sport known worldwide as pro-wrestling, recognized as much for its theatrical antics and entertainment as wrestling ability. However, this change did not become predominant until following the Second World War, and there are still forms of Shoot wrestling existing in professional wrestling, in the present day. Some even argue that Mixed Martial Arts is the next stage in the cycle of professional wrestling changing back and forth, between a legitimate sport and an athletic form of entertainment.

Other Catch Wrestling (or "Freestyle") and Greco-Roman, however, did not change at all in the sense of competitiveness or legitimacy and remain practiced Olympic sports to this day.