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HISTORY OF SOCCER,
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ST PAULS CATHEDRAL LONDON, ST PAULS SCHOOL AND THEIR PLACE IN THE HISTORY OF SOCCER
RICHARD MULCASTER was the Headmaster of ST PAULS SCHOOL from 1596 and is considered to be the Father of Modern Football. There is no doubt that he holds a prominent position in the History of Football, in it's development from what was termed Mob Football into what we see today in the modern game.
He was the first headmaster at Merchant Taylors School in London, taking up the position in 1561. It was at the time the largest school in the country and he is best known for his headmasterships and pedagogic writings.
It was Richard Mulcaster who made the most convincing case for a move away from Latin, which had up until then held sway as the language of learning.
In his work, the Elementaire, which was published in 1582, he provoked a movement which ultimately led to English displacing Latin as the language of learning throughout the English speaking world.
He became headmaster of St.Pauls School in 1596 and has been described as the greatest advocate of football during the sixteenth century period, in the developing History of Soccer.
Therefore by association there is a connection and place for St Pauls Cathedral London in the History of Football.
England has had an immense part to play throughout the History of Soccer, in the development of the game as we know it today.
It has been popular in England for centuries, playing a huge part in the lives of our ancestors, with suggestions that some form of the game had been played by the Roman Legions during their occupation.
ABOVE: AN ILLUSTRATION DEPICTING MEDIEVAL FOOTBALL OR MOB FOOTBALL.
However, to suggest it originated in England, would be well wide of the mark, for some form of the game has been played in every part of the world that man has ever occupied.
It was the modern game which was first established in England during the nineteenth century which immortalizes England's name in the History of Soccer.
Football was very popular with the peasant classes during the Middle Ages (sixth century to late fifteenth century). Games, known as mob football or Shrovetide football, would be arranged between villages, involving any number of players on opposing sides.
Without any specifically defined size of pitch as we have nowadays, these opposing teams would commit themselves, by fair means or foul and with anything at their disposal, to move an inflated pig's bladder to a pre-defined marker in their opponents half.
In other words the size of the pitch could be anything, even stretching between the villages if necessary, taking in streets, fields or any other place where the ball happened to land.
These games were extremely violent and without any fixed rules of engagement. Kicking and punching ones opponents was commonplace. They were continually being banned as a result.
When football began to be played in London is unclear, but by the latter part of the twelfth century, the game is known to have become established in the city.
Along with many towns and cities, it is known to have held traditional Shrove Tuesday football (Mob Football) games as part of their community celebrations. The History of Soccer has many reports of people being killed, either by accidentally running into an opponents dagger, or being intentionally stabbed.
The first record in the History of Soccer of a ball game being played in London was by William Fitzstephen (died c. 1191), a monk in the employ of Thomas a Becket, and a witness to his murder.
He wrote a biography of the Saint and an account of London in the twelfth century, with which he prefaced it (c.1174-1183). The following is an extract from that account, describing the activities of London youths during the annual festival of Shrove Tuesday.
"After lunch all the youth of the city go out into the fields to take part in a ball game. The students of each school have their own ball; the workers from each city craft are also carrying their balls.
Older citizens, fathers, and wealthy citizens come on horseback to watch their juniors competing, and to relive their own youth vicariously: you can see their inner passions aroused as they watch the action and get caught up in the fun being had by the carefree adolescents."
The first account of a kicking ball game is from 1280, which took place at Ulgham, near Ashington in Northumberland, in which a player was killed as a result of running against an opposing player's dagger.
This account is noteworthy because it the earliest reference to an English ball game that definitely involved kicking; this suggests that earlier ball games in England did not necessarily involve the kicking of the ball.
HISTORY OF SOCCER: 14TH CENTURY
The Medieval Kings and Nobility had no love for the game at all, in 1314 the Lord Mayor of London, Nicholas de Farndone issued a decree on behalf of King Edward II banning football.
This was the earliest reference to a game which was called football. "For as much as there is great noise in the city, caused by hustling over large balls from which many evils might arise which God forbid, we command and forbid, on behalf of the king, on pain of imprisonment, such game to be used in the city in the future."
Between 1314 and 1667, football was officially banned in England alone by more than 30 royal and local laws.
The reasons for the ban by Edward III, on June 12, 1349, were explicit: football and other recreations distracted the populace from practicing archery, which was necessary for war, and after the great loss of life that had occurred during the Black Death, England needed as many archers as possible.
A proclamation was issued by the same King Edward III in 1363 banning, "handball, football, or hockey; coursing and cock-fighting, or other such idle games". This showed that there was a handball game and a football game, both of which were certainly considered to be two different types of games.
There is a mention of a ball game being played at Oxford University in 1303 and other references imply that these ball games were taken to the Universities by students who had played them at the public schools they had attended.
The Oxford University reference was from Thomas of Salisbury, a student there, who apparently discovered his brother Adam dead. He had allegedly been killed by Irish students whilst playing the ball in the High Street towards Eastgate.
HISTORY OF SOCCER 15TH AND 16TH CENTURIES.
Another early documented use of the English word football was in a proclamation issued by King Henry IV in 1409 forbidding the levying of money for "foteball".
There is also an account in Latin from the end of the 15th century of football being played at Cawston, Nottinghamshire. This is the first description of a "kicking game" and the first description of dribbling: "[t]he game at which they had met for common recreation is called by some the foot-ball game. It is one in which young men, in country sport, propel a huge ball not by throwing it into the air but by striking it and rolling it along the ground, and that not with their hands but with their feet... kicking in opposite directions" The chronicler gives the earliest reference to a football pitch, stating that: "[t]he boundaries have been marked and the game had started.
Football was completely banned from being played at St. John's College Oxford in 1555, followed shortly after by a wholesale ban at Cambridge University. This was the first specific reference to the game of football being played at Universities.
HISTORY OF SOCCER 17TH CENTURY
In 1608, the local authorities in Manchester were complaining that: "With the ffotebale...[there] hath beene greate disorder in our towne of Manchester we are told, and glasse windowes broken yearlye and spoyled by a companie of lewd and disordered persons...."
The same year, the word "football" was used disapprovingly by William Shakespeare. Shakespeare's play King Lear contains the line: "Nor tripped neither, you base football player" (Act I, Scene 4). Shakespeare also mentions the game in A Comedy of Errors (Act II, Scene 1):
Am I so round with you as you with me, That like a football you do spurn me thus?
You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither: If I last in this service, you must case me in leather.
"Spurn" literally means to kick away, thus implying that the game involved kicking a ball between players.
King James I of England's Book of Sports (1618) however, instructs Christians to play at football every Sunday afternoon after worship. The book's aim appears to be an attempt to offset the strictness of the Puritans regarding the keeping of the Sabbath.
