The World Cup in Brazil is in full swing, and this world-famous national event has also occupied the headlines of major media overnight, setting off a worldwide football storm. In ancient China, Cuju, the earliest form of football, was deeply loved by emperors, generals and ordinary people as a national top-level event. People's enthusiasm for Cuju was no less than the madness of staying up late to watch the World Cup.
As we all know, in early 2004, FIFA confirmed that football originated in China. According to the Warring States Policy and Historical Records, Cuju was popular in Linzi, the capital of Qi State, during the Spring and Autumn Period more than 2,300 years ago. In the Han Dynasty, due to the implementation of Liu Bang, a "super fan" of Emperor Gaozu, Cuju gradually developed into a very professional sport, and professional football fields with walls and stands began to appear in the palace, the so-called Cheng Ju. The game is divided into two teams, each team has 12 players, and the outcome is determined by the number of goals scored, which is the embryonic form of modern football. It is said that from then on, the emperors of the Western Han Dynasty, such as Liu Che, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Liu Ao and Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty, all liked playing football. When Liu Che played football, he also asked his literary attendants to write Cuju Fu.
Where there are games, there are stars. Gao Qiu, described in Shi Naian's "Water Margin", was a famous star in the Song Dynasty. He changed from a street thug to the commander-in-chief in front of the temple and often played football with Song Huizong. In addition, in the Song Dynasty, a number of professional stars gathered in the capital city of the Northern Song Dynasty and Lin 'an City of the Southern Song Dynasty. They regularly play football at cuju banquets in the palace. They make a living by playing football. They were professional stars with high status at that time.
During the Southern Song Dynasty, the players in the Song Dynasty also organized the Bona Health Cup, which is equivalent to today's Super League. The players' club, named Yun Qi Club, is a specialized cuju organization and the earliest individual sports association in China. Its ten key rules of sincerity, gentleness, respect and modesty, as well as ten prohibitions against talkativeness, gambling, madness and debauchery, have also become the embryonic form of the earliest team rules in China. After the Song Dynasty, cuju was still popular among nobles and officials. After the establishment of the Qing Dynasty, Manchu people who loved skating combined it with skating and invented the pattern of cuju on the ice. Until 1863, modern football was born in Britain, which opened another historical chapter in the development of football.
Song Taizu, a fan, is best at fancy football. In the Tang Dynasty, cuju became popular because both Emperor Taizong and Emperor Xuanzong loved watching cuju, and the emperors and officials in the palace also fell in love with cuju. Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin is also a crazy "fan", which can be seen from the existing "Cuju Map of Song Taizu". Song Taizu Cuju is 28.6 cm wide and 56.3 cm long. The original author is Su Hanchen, a famous painter in the Northern Song Dynasty, and the replica of Qian Xuan is now in the Palace Museum in Beijing. The picture is elegant in color, with Gu Zhuo, Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin and his younger brother Song Taizong playing football and watching Zhao Pu, Chu Zhaofu, Dangjin, Shi Shouxin and other four great founding feats of the Song Dynasty. At that time, Zhao Kuangyin was famous for playing football. He is especially good at "white kicking", which is now called "fancy football", that is, when kicking the ball, he touches the ball with his head, shoulders, back, abdomen, knees, feet and other parts, changes flexibly and does whatever he wants, so that the ball does not land all day.
In addition to the ball skills, the production technology of Cuju in Song Dynasty was also improved compared with that in Tang Dynasty, forming a standard production technology. For example, the spherical surface has been developed from eight pieces to twelve pieces, the raw material is "cooked nitrate yellow skin, and the solid material is lightly cut", and the technology is "closely laid and tightly stitched, without exposing the line angle". After cuju is made, the weight is still "twelve taels" and the specifications should be "very round". The progress of technology opened the second period of the development of ancient football in China for the Cuju fever in Song Dynasty, and also provided the most valuable information for future generations to study the development of football in Song Dynasty.
The ancient women's football team loved red makeup more than Cuju. Since the Yuan Dynasty, Cuju has become a national sport, and many women have also fallen in love with Cuju. Dewey, a painter in the Ming Dynasty, painted a picture of a lady playing cuju, depicting the scene of a lady playing cuju in the garden. Unlike the modern women's football team, which advocates strength and speed, women's cuju mainly focuses on performance, which requires higher appearance, figure and technology for women engaged in cuju. Therefore, women's cuju was also called "beauty cuju" in ancient times, which reflected the unique feminine beauty of women in cuju. Qian Mingfu wrote a poem "Cuju", "On the spot of Cuju in February, the fairy wind blew down two beautiful Juan, and the sweat was stained with powder dew, and the dust floated with the smoke. Jade bamboo shoots hang low in the green sleeves, and golden lotus is exposed obliquely in the red skirt. After several trips, I became weak and hated Chang 'an beautiful teenagers. "You can see the beautiful customs at that time. It is said that the overall level of "women's football" in the palace of the Tang Dynasty is very high, and it is regarded as "royal women's football". Unfortunately, after the Five Dynasties, because of the appearance of bad foot binding, women were directly deprived of the right to play football, and the "women's football" gradually disappeared.
In addition to the above-mentioned classic works, Cuju Tu by Ma Yuan, a court painter of the Southern Song Dynasty who is now in the Cleveland Museum of Art, and Cuju Tu by Huang Shen of Tianjin History Museum are both excellent works describing the theme of football in the history of China. (Francisco Jailson de Souza)