Pole-vaulting is one of those weird sports where I watch it and am like, how the hell did people invent this? It seems like most things which we now do for sport were once done for survival (running, swimming), or for some sort of practical purpose. I was theorizing that pole vaulting was maybe done by ancient soldiers to get over walls and attack castles and villages and stuff.

But then I looked it up, and found no mention of it as a martial tool. Instead, they said the origins of it were indistinct. Although they do know that ancient Greeks and Cretans used poles to vault over bulls, and that Celts used it for long jump competitions. Also, there was some mention that the pole was used to get people across small rivers and canals and things. Which makes the most sense of all the ideas I’ve heard so far.

Most of those techniques were for distance though and not height. Apparently Germans brought the vertical element in the 1700’s. Wasn’t until the late 1800’s where the modern technique is used, with the legs inverted, and clearing it with your stomach. Previous competitions also used poles made out of ash wood which was not flexible, and athletes would sort of climb up the pole as they jumped. This was outlawed in competitions in 1889 in America. Then in the 1950’s people started experimenting with materials in poles, which made them flexible. Aluminum, steel, copper were all attempted and abandoned, until the modern fiberglass pole came into widespread use.

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