Transcript: 20260615-History Is Inquiry - Ancient Martial Arts w⧸Tom Billinge -Gods, Wolves & War @WarYoga #ancientgreece

>> You can actually [music] if you we see it in the in the map, we'll be in the middle of it. So probably things have started to happen to the west and also to the east. >> Yeah. >> And and have you as you have been living in the east you are from the west and have you been seeing this similarities >> especially to India being sort of crux point actually because that was a point of exchange between east and west. So

Fighting in an earthen pit doing so for competition, doing so without weapons and doing so for honor and for honor for the gods and in order to prove yourself the best I the one that is essentially the substitute for the sacrifice cuz this concept of the of martial arts as a sacrifice to the gods and the victor being the substitute of the sacrificial victim the one that's chosen by the gods. These are concepts that you find across from India all the way to Europe. The Greeks have

The most profound expression of that ultimately because it just was I guess very very much within the nature of the culture that developed there this idea of the agon the struggle which is something that remains today in Greece agonistic society as they call it. Um but there's certain concepts and certain threads that are found across the board and so what's very interesting as well is if you're looking at timelines so the oldest martial art quote unquote

Combat sport complete combat sport if you exclude wrestling and you exclude boxing but like in terms of a martial art where you actually have all striking, all grappling, is ancient Greek pankration. It's predates pretty much everything else that exists across the world. And especially cuz it's a complex full system which involves all elements of combat.

Now, that develops in Greece. And then, while Alexander the Great himself was not known to be a practitioner of the art, he brought his soldiers with him who were. And everywhere he went, he set up a gymnasium and a palestra, a wrestling school. So, every single one of the cities that he set up has a palestra, has has that. And the furthest one is deep into Greco-Bactria in a place called Ai Khanoum on the edge of Afghanistan, what's modern Afghanistan. And they have a palestra there from Alexander the Great's time,

From his successors, actually, I believe. >> But you can follow the the cult kind of thing. You know what I mean? Like, when you see the cult, let's say we're saying everything. Like, what we will say medicine or practices or however you want. >> Right. The athlete alone or the warrior is too much of a thug. And the philosopher alone is a thinker and a weak man. That actually what you really need is to have the combination of the both to make the perfect citizen, a philosopher athlete,

Somebody who is both skilled in combat, fighting arts, and physicality, and some at the same time skilled in culture, thought, and the arts. That one of the other alone is not good enough. You need both to be complete. >> Martial will mean comes from Mars.

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>> Yeah, the mar- yeah, the martial metaphysical tradition. >> Yeah, I know what you mean. We all know what you mean. I mean, [music and singing] we were there like for almost 2 weeks. >> Oh, wow. >> So, and we were living in the north of the island.