Football is a family of team sports in which the object is to get the ball over a goal line, into a goal, or between goalposts using merely the body (by carrying, throwing, or kicking).
Unqualified, the word football generally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly called football include association football (known as soccer in Australia, Canada, South Africa, the United States, and sometimes in Ireland and New Zealand); Australian rules football; Gaelic football; gridiron football (specifically American football, arena football, or Canadian football); International rules football; rugby league football; and rugby union football. These various forms of football share, to varying degrees, common origins and are known as "football codes".
There are a number of references to traditional, ancient, or prehistoric ball games played in many different parts of the world. Contemporary codes of football can be traced back to the codification of these games at English public schools during the 19th century, itself an outgrowth of medieval football. The expansion and cultural power of the British Empire allowed these rules of football to spread to areas of British influence outside the directly controlled empire. By the end of the 19th century, distinct regional codes were already developing: Gaelic football, for example, deliberately incorporated the rules of local traditional football games to maintain their heritage. In 1888, the Football League was founded in England, becoming the first of many professional football associations. During the 20th century, several of the various kinds of football grew to become some of the most popular team sports in the world.
Common elements
The various codes of football share certain common elements and can be grouped into two main classes of football: carrying codes like American football, Canadian football, Australian football, rugby union and rugby league, where the ball is moved about the field while being held in the hands or passed by hand, and kicking codes such as association football and Gaelic football, where the ball is moved primarily with the feet, and where handling is strictly limited. Common rules among the sports include: Two teams usually have between 11 and 18 players; some variations that have fewer players (five or more per team) are also popular. A clearly defined area in which to play the game. Scoring goals or points by moving the ball to an opposing team's end of the field and either into a goal area, or over a line. Goals or points resulting from players putting the ball between two goalposts. The goal or line being defended by the opposing team. Players using only their body to move the ball, i.e. no additional equipment such as bats or sticks. An inflatable ball. In all codes, common skills include passing, tackling, evasion of tackles, catching and kicking. In most codes, there are rules restricting the movement of players offside, and players scoring a goal must put the ball either under or over a crossbar between the goalposts.
Etymology
The name "football" derives from the ball used in the game, which was apparently so named because it was moved with the feet. An alternative explanation holds that the game was named "football" because it was played on foot, not on horseback.
Early history Ancient games
Ancient China
The Chinese competitive game cuju (蹴鞠) is an early type of ball game where feet were used, in some aspects resembling modern association football. It was possibly played around the Han dynasty and early Qin dynasty, based on an attestation in a military manual from around the second to third centuries BC. In one version, gameplay consisted of players passing the ball between teammates without allowing it to touch the ground (much like keepie uppie). In its competitive version, two teams had to pass the ball without it falling, before kicking the ball through a circular hole placed in the middle of the pitch. Unlike association football, the two teams did not interact with each other but instead stayed on opposite sides of the pitch. Cuju has been cited by FIFA as the earliest form of football. The Japanese version of cuju is kemari (蹴鞠), and was developed during the Asuka period. This is known to have been played within the Japanese imperial court in Kyoto from about 600 AD. In kemari, several people stand in a circle and kick a ball to each other, trying not to let the ball drop to the ground. The Silk Road facilitated the transmission of cuju, especially the game popular in the Tang dynasty, the period when the inflatable ball was invented and replaced the stuffed ball.
Ancient Greece and Rome
The Ancient Greeks and Romans are known to have played many ball games, some of which involved the use of the feet. The Roman game is believed to have been adapted from a Greek team game known as ()ἐπίσκυρος , Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus Digital LibraryThe New Encyclopædia Britannica, 2007 Edition: "In ancient Greece a game with elements of football, , or , was played, and it had migrated to Rome as by the 2nd century BC". or (),φαινίνδα , Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus Digital Library which is mentioned by a Greek playwright, Antiphanes (388–311 BC) and later referred to by the Christian theologian Clement of Alexandria ( – ). These games appear to have resembled rugby football.Nigel Wilson, Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece, Routledge, 2005, p. 310Nigel M. Kennell, The Gymnasium of Virtue: Education and Culture in Ancient Sparta (Studies in the History of Greece and Rome), The University of North Carolina Press, 1995, on Google Books Steve Craig, Sports and Games of the Ancients: (Sports and Games Through History), Greenwood, 2002, on Google Books Don Nardo, Greek and Roman Sport, Greenhaven Press, 1999, p. 83Sally E. D. Wilkins, Sports and games of medieval cultures, Greenwood, 2002, on Google books The Roman politician Cicero (106–43 BC) describes the case of a man who was killed whilst having a shave when a ball was kicked into a barber's shop. Roman ball games already knew the air-filled ball, the .E. Norman Gardiner: "Athletics in the Ancient World", Courier Dover Publications, 2002, , p. 229William Smith: "Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities", 1857, p. 777 is described as an early form of football by FIFA.
Native Americans There are a number of references to traditional, ancient, or prehistoric ball games, played by indigenous peoples in many different parts of the world. For example, in 1586, men from a ship commanded by an English explorer named John Davis went ashore to play a form of football with Inuit in Greenland.Richard Hakluyt, Voyages in Search of The North-West Passage , University of Adelaide, 29 December 2003 There are later accounts of an Inuit game played on ice, called Aqsaqtuk. Each match began with two teams facing each other in parallel lines, before attempting to kick the ball through each other team's line and then at a goal. In 1610, William Strachey, a colonist at Jamestown, Virginia recorded a game played by Native Americans, called Pahsaheman.Pahsahëman — The Lenape Indian Football Game on delawaretribe.org Pasuckuakohowog, a game similar to modern-day association football played amongst Amerindians, was also reported as early as the 17th century.Pasuckuakohowog — Football With 1,000 Players and Zero Rules by Roshan Kumar. 29 May 2025 at curiousroshan.com Games played in Mesoamerica with rubber balls by indigenous peoples are also well-documented as existing since before this time,The Ball Game of Mesoamerica by Mark Cartwright on World History.com. published on 16 September 2013 but these had more similarities to basketball or volleyball, and no links have been found between such games and modern football sports. Northeastern American Indians, especially the Iroquois Confederation, played a game which made use of net racquets to throw and catch a small ball; however, although it is a ball-goal foot game, lacrosse (as its modern descendant is called) is likewise not usually classed as a form of "football".The Iroquois' quest to compete in Olympic lacrosse: 'It's more than a game to us.' By Wayne Drehs on The National Geographic. 17 November 2020
Oceania On the Australian continent several tribes of indigenous people played kicking and catching games with stuffed balls which have been generalised by historians as Marn Grook (Djab Wurrung for "game ball"). The earliest historical account is an anecdote from the 1878 book by Robert Brough-Smyth, The Aborigines of Victoria, in which a man called Richard Thomas is quoted as saying, in about 1841 in Victoria, Australia, that he had witnessed Aboriginal people playing the game: "Mr Thomas describes how the foremost player will drop kick a ball made from the skin of a possum and how other players leap into the air to catch it." Some historians have theorised that Marn Grook was one of the origins of Australian rules football. The Māori in New Zealand played a game called Kī-o-rahi consisting of teams of seven players play on a circular field divided into zones, and score points by touching the 'pou' (boundary markers) and hitting a central 'tupu' or target.Story of the game on kiorahi.com These games and others may well go far back into antiquity. However, the main sources of modern football codes appear to lie in western Europe, especially England.The history of football in England By Simon Inglis at english-heritage.org.uk
Turkic peoples Mahmud al-Kashgari in his Dīwān Lughāt al-Turk, described a game called tepuk among Turks in Central Asia. In the game, people try to attack each other's castle by kicking a ball made of sheep leather.
Medieval and early modern Europe
The Middle Ages saw a huge rise in popularity of annual Shrovetide football matches throughout Europe, particularly in England. An early reference to a ball game played in Britain comes from the 9th-century Historia Brittonum, attributed to Nennius, which describes "a party of boys ... playing at ball".Historia Brittonum at the Medieval Sourcebook. References to a ball game played in northern France known as La Soule or Choule, in which the ball was propelled by hands, feet, and sticks, date from the 12th century.Jusserand, Jean-Jules. (1901). Le sport et les jeux d'exercice dans l'ancienne France. Retrieved 11 January 2008, from http://agora.qc.ca/reftext.nsf/Documents/Football--Le_sport_et_les_jeux_dexercice_dans_lancienne_France__La_soule_par_Jean-Jules_Jusserand
The early forms of football played in England, sometimes referred to as "mob football", would be played in towns or between neighbouring villages, involving an unlimited number of players on opposing teams who would clash en masse, struggling to move an item, such as inflated animal's bladder to particular geographical points, such as their opponents' church, with play taking place in the open space between neighbouring parishes. The game was played primarily during significant religious festivals, such as Shrovetide, Christmas, or Easter, and Shrovetide games have survived into the modern era in a number of English towns (see below). The first detailed description of what was almost certainly football in England was given by William FitzStephen in about 1174–1183. He described the activities of London youths during the annual festival of Shrove Tuesday:
Most of the very early references to the game speak simply of "ball play" or "playing at ball". This reinforces the idea that the games played at the time did not necessarily involve a ball being kicked.