INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC ACADEMY 7th JOINT - IOA

centuries later, enabled some English scholars to create a set of
theories concerning this topic. The 18 th century, the age of the
Enlightenment, certainly played a crucial role in this development.
The greatest achievement of the 18 th century depicted the rise of
organized scholarly work "all facts, or supposed facts, were welcome"
(Cobban 1957: 93). People were observing everything; mainly their
mundane lives in order to gather information and perhaps in attempt to
understand their own behaviour. Cobban (1957) notes: "a study of the
writings of the Enlightenment on the social sciences and history soon
reveals, behind the apparent determination to seize on objective facts
and base the argument on these alone, the existence of theoretical
presuppositions" (Cobban 1957: 95). The urge to collect data from
which certain analysis of sport could be made was common to almost
every 18 th century scholar. In the field of sport one name stands out,
namely Joseph Strutt.
An educated engraver, who started his career in the reading-room
of the British Museum, became interested in almost every aspect of
life. His works described manners, customs and dresses of the English
people, the history of England, and most notably a thorough
description of English sports and pastimes. Sports and Pastimes of the
People of England published in 1801 was a volume describing in
every possible detail both sports of the aristocracy and the common
people. He gathered information also about children's games and also
did not forget to mention the pastimes characteristic to women. In his
book he also referred to Robert Dover's Games. This magnificent
collection of leisure time activities was aimed at showing the English
people how diverse their culture was and perhaps indirectly at making
them aware of the importance of sport in their lives. This kind of
awareness was particularly useful on the onset of the 19 th century, the
age of industrialization.
The change that was caused by growing industry brought on the
one hand the decline in the practice of any sport, due to the lack of
time and more often the strength. "Not only was there less time for
sporting activities, but the arduous hours of physical labour are likely
to have reduced the capacity and inclination to engage in physically
demanding pastimes" (Hargreaves 1986: 22). The supervisors in
factories for fear of losing profits when the workers’ strength was
employed somewhere else, e.g. playing football, began to control their
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