Physical activity and the construction of body cult in ancient Greece

• Main Author: Luiz César Teixeira dos Santos
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universidade Estadual de Maringá 2008-06-01
• Series: Revista da Educação Física
• Subjects: Educação Física; corporeidade; Grécia antiga; história; trabalho
• Online Access: http://186.233.154.254/ojs/index.php/RevEducFis/article/view/3931

The present work has the objective to discuss some issues related to the way in which the body cult in Ancient Greece was built. We based ourselves upon Homer’s and Hesíod’s poetry in which they elicit the way of living of that time and the influences they exercised upon the activities of that period and upon the individual’s body. The relationship between the necessary activities to their survival and the ideal type of man was very important to the Greeks. In fact, this relationship was allusive to corporal standards. Thus it seems very important that physical education brings into scene these issues when it tells its own history since it deals with the thoughts and the way of being of that historical period which helped construct the basis on which the western world is grounded.