THE PAN-SCANDINAVIAN GAMES (1834-1836)

1. HISTORY

It is said that the first true prototype of the modern games emerged in Sweden in the 1830s under the initiative of Professor Gustav Johann Schartau. In July 1834, he organized some Pan-Scandinavian games ‘in commemoration of the Ancient Olympic Games’ at Rämlosa, near Helsingborg, on the southernmost tip of Sweden.

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Competitions were held in wrestling, high jump, pole vault, rope climbing, gymnastic exercises and long and short-distance running. On 4 August 1836, the second ‘Scandinavian Olympic Games' were held in Rämlosa, and competitions for the best reading of compositions having to do with the Olympic Games were introduced. However, these games did not catch on and were never held again. They are also commonly known as Swedish Olympics.

2. PROF. GUSTAV JOHANN SCHARTAU’S LIFE

It was during the summer of 1833 that an association was founded in Helsingborg and gave itself the name ‘Olympic Association’. It is probably the town’s oldest sports association. The initiative had been taken by Gustav Johann Schartau (1794-1852), a gymnastic and fencing Professot at the University of Lund. He was a disciple of P. H. Ling, the founder of Swedish gymnastics.

Schartau wrote proclamations and articles which he had published in the Helsingborg and Lund newspapers. He also managed to gather round him a good number of well known people in the region. In 1834 and 1836, the association organized what the newspapers of the time called either ‘Olympic Competitions’ or ‘the Olympic Games’ at Ramlösa, a well-known thermal spa and bathing resort, close to Helsingborg.

3. HISTORY

The Association’s announcement had a programme that included the following events: running, gymnastics, wrestling and pole climbing. At that time, gymnastics meant not only the high jump and the pole vault but also acrobatics, that is, vaulting over a real or wooden horse, throwing and balancing exercises, etc. In short, more or less the same events as in modern athletics. For these two years, the competitions were also linked to horse racing at Ramlösa racecourse.

For the 1836 Games, a competition in literary composition on the theme of the Ancient Games compared with the chivalric jousts and tournaments of the Middle Ages and the relevance and usefulness of reviving these contests was added to the programme.

The press and the public gave the Olympic association an enthusiastic welcome The Helsingborg newspapers, rather surprisingly, devoted lots of space in their columns to it in the form of editorials, articles, accounts, etc. These competitions drew thousands of spectators, while the number of participants was comparatively low about forty. Naturally, these Olympic Games at Helsingborg cannot in any way be compared with those of today but as far as the original idea and form concerned, they were near enough.

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4. REFERENCES AND OTHER RESOURCES

The First Modern Olympics by David Randall

Pierre de Coubertin and the Origins of the Modern Olympic Games by John J. MacAloon

Edited by Estela González Torres

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