history of swimming

Swimming has been recorded since prehistoric times; the earliest recording of swimming dates back to Stone Age paintings from around 7,000 years ago. Written references date from 2000 BC. Some of the earliest references to swimming include the Gilgamesh, the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Bible, Beowulf, and other sagas. In 1578, Nikolaus Wynmann, a German professor of languages, wrote the first swimming book, The Swimmer or A Dialogue on the Art of Swimming (Der Schwimmer oder ein Zwiegespräch über die Schwimmkunst). Competitive swimming in Europe started around 1800, mostly using breaststroke. In 1873, John Arthur Trudgen introduced the trudgen to Western swimming competitions, after copying the front crawl used by Native Americans. Due to a British dislike of splashing, Trudgen employed a scissor kick instead of the front crawl's flutter kick. Swimming was part of the first modern Olympic games in 1896 in Athens. In 1902 Richard Cavill introduced the front crawl to the Western world. In 1908, thefrom the Stone Age were found in the "Cave of Swimmers" near Wadi Sora on the Gilf Kebir plateau in southwestern Egypt, near the Libyan border. These pictures seem to show breaststroke or dog paddle, although it may also be possible that the movements have a ritual meaning unrelated to swimming. This cave is also featured in the movie The English Patient. An Egyptian clay seal dated between 4000 BC and 9000 BC shows four swimmers who are believed to be swimming a variant of the front crawl. More references to swimming are found in Babylonian bas-reliefs and Assyrian wall drawings, depicting a variant of the breaststroke. The most famous drawings were found in the Kebir desert and are estimated to be from around 4000 BC. The Nagoda bas-relief also shows swimmers inside of men dating back from 3000 BC The Indian palace Mohenjo Daro from 2800 BC contains a swimming pool sized 30 m by 60 m. The Minoan palace Minos of Knossos in Crete also featured baths. An Egyptian tomb from 2000 BC shows a variant of the front crawl. Depictions of swimmers were also found from the Hittites, Minoans, and other Middle Eastern civilizations, in the Tepantitla compound at Teotihuacan, and in mosaics in Pompeii.
Written references date back to ancient times, with the earliest as early as 2000 BC. Such references occur in works like Gilgamesh, the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Bible (Ezekiel 47:5, Acts 27:42, Isaiah 25:11), Beowulf, and other sagas, although the style is never described. There are also many mentions of swimmers in the Vatican, Borgian and Bourbon codices. A series of reliefs from 850 BC in the Nimrud Gallery of the British Museum show swimmers, mostly in military context, often using swimming aids.
The Germanic folklore describes swimming, which was used successfully in wars against the Romans
Swimming was initially one of the seven agilities of knights during the Middle Ages, including swimming with armour. However, as swimming was done in a state of undress, it became less popular as society became more conservative in the early Modern period. For example, in the 16th century, a German court document in the Vechta prohibited the naked ( meaning everything exposed) public swimming of children. Leonardo da Vinci made early sketches of lifebelts.
In 1539, Nicolas Wynman, German professor of languages, wrote the first swimming book Colymbetes. His goal wasn't exercise, but instead it was to reduce the dangers of drowning. Nevertheless, the book contained a very good and methodical approach to learning breaststroke, and includes swimming aids such as air filled cow bladders, reed bundles, or cork belts. In 1587, Everard Digby also wrote a swimming book, claiming that humans can swim better than fish. Digby was a Senior Fellow at St. John's College, Cambridge, interested in the scientific method. His short treatise, De arte natandi, was written in Latin and contained over 40 woodcut illustrations depicting various methods of swimming, including the breaststroke, backstroke and the crawl. Digby regarded the breaststroke as the most useful form of swimming.^[1] In 1603, the first national swimming organization was established in Japan. Emperor Go-Yozei of Japan declared that school children should swim.^{[citation needed]}
In 1696, the French author Melchisédech Thévenot (1620 or 1621 to 1692) wrote The Art of Swimming, describing a breaststroke very similar to the modern breaststroke. This book was translated into English and became the standard reference of swimming for many years to come, and was read by Benjamin Franklin. In 1708, the first known lifesaving group, "Chinkiang Association for the Saving of Life," was established in China. Benjamin Franklin is credited with the invention of the swimming fins at the age of ten, in 1716. In 1739, Guts Muts (also spelled as Guts Muth) from Schnepfenthal, Germany, wrote Gymnastik für die Jugend (Exercise for the youth), including a significant portion about swimming. In 1794, Kanonikus Oronzio de Bernardi of Italy wrote a two volume book about swimming, including floating practice as a prerequisite for swimming studies. In 1798, Guts Muts wrote another book Kleines Lehrbuch der Schwimmkunst zum Selbstunterricht (Small study book of the art of swimming for self study), recommending the use of a "fishing rod" device to aid in the learning of swimming. His books describe a three step approach to learn swimming that is still used today. First, get the student used to the water, second, practice the swimming movements out of the water, third, practice the swimming movements in the water. He believed that swimming is an essential part of every education.
More lifesaving groups were established in 1767 (1768?) in Amsterdam by the Dutch, 1772 in Copenhagen, and in 1774 by Great Britain. In 1768, a humane society was established in the United States. In 1796, a (still existing) swimming club, the Upsala Simsällskap, was founded in Uppsala, Sweden. The Haloren, a group of salt makers in Halle, Germany, greatly advanced swimming through setting a good example to others by teaching their children swimming at a very early agen 1804, the lifebelt was invented by W.H. Mallison, the device being known at that time as the "Seaman’s Friend". However, the lifebelts took up valuable space on ships, and the United States Navy was worried about the devices being used by sailors to desert.
The first German swimming club was founded in 1817 in Berlin.^{[citation needed]} A journal mentions "swimming skates" in France, which may be an early version of a surfboard.
One watershed event was a swimming competition in 1844 in London. Some Native Americans participated in this competition.^{[citation needed]} While the British raced using breaststroke, the Native Americans swam a variant of the front crawl, which had been used by people in the Americas, West Africa and some Pacific islands for generations, but was not known to the British. As the front crawl is much faster than the breaststroke, the Americans easily beat the British: Flying Gull won the medal, swimming the 150 feet (46 m) in 30 seconds, and second place went to another American named Tobacco. Their stroke was described as making a motion with the arms "like a windmill" and kicking the legs up and down. As this produced considerable splashing, it was considered barbaric and "un-European" to the British gentlemen, who preferred to keep their heads above water. Subsequently, the British continued to swim only breaststroke until 1873.
From 1847, Nancy Edberg was active as the first woman instructor in swimming in Stockholm, making swimming tutoring accessible for both genders: she later introduced swimming lessons for women also in Denmark and Norway^[2]; her public swimming exhibitions from 1856 with her students where likely among the first, if not the first, public exhibitions of women swimming in Europe^[3]
The first indoor swimming pool was built in England in 1862^{[citation needed]}. An Amateur Swimming Association of Great Britain was organized in 1880 with more than 300 members. The main swimming styles were the breaststroke and the recently developed side stroke. In the sidestroke, the swimmer lies on one side. Initially, the arms were brought forward under water, but this was soon modified to bring the arm forward over water to reduce resistance and to improve the speed, resulting in an overarm sidestroke. The legs were squeezed together in a scissor style. In 1895, J. H. Thayers of England swam 100 yards (91 m) in a record-breaking 1:02.50 using a sidestroke.
Sometime between 1870 and 1890 (the date is most often given as 1873), John Arthur Trudgen reintroduced the front crawl to England, having learned the stroke from Native Americans during a trip to South America. His stroke, a variant of the front crawl, came to be called the Trudgen or Trudgeon. The arms were brought forward, alternating, while the body rolled from side to side. The kick was a scissors kick such as that familiarly used in breaststroke, with one kick for two arm strokes, although it is believed that the Native Americans had indeed used a flutter kick. Front crawl variants used different ratios of scissor kicks to arm strokes, or alternated with a flutter (up-and-down) kick. The speed of the new stroke was demonstrated by F.V.C. Lane in 1901, swimming 100 yards (91 m) in 1:00.0, an improvement of about ten seconds compared to the breaststroke record. This style is the first European version of the front crawl, the fastest swimming style known today. Due to its speed the Trudgen became very quickly popular around the world, despite all the ungentlemanlike splashing.
Captain Matthew Webb was the first man to swim the English channel (between England and France), in 1875. He used breaststroke, swimming 21.26 miles (34.21 km) in 21 hours and 45 minutes. No other man or woman swam the channel for the next 31 years. He died in 1882 while attempting to swim the Niagara Falls. The first European amateur swimming competitions were in 1889 in Vienna.
In 1879, King Ludwig II of Bavaria built a swimming pool in castle Linderhof. This is believed to be the first artificial wave pool and also featured electrically heated water and light.mark anthony cobate........the egelloc stneduts.
.
world swimming association, Fédération Internationale de Natation (FINA), was formed. Butterfly was developed in the 1930s and was at first a variant of breaststroke, until it was accepted as a separate style in 1952.