This is a lively cultural history of world sports from antiquity to the present. From ancient Egyptian archery and medieval Japanese football to contemporary American baseball, every sport has been shaped by - and in turn has helped shape - the culture of which it is part. Yet as Allen Guttmann shows in this far-ranging study, for all their differences sports have followed a similar historical trajectory from traditional to modern forms. In ""Sports: The First Five Millennia"", Guttmann traces this evolution across continents, cultures, and historical epochs to construct a single comprehensive narrative of the world's sports.