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The Americas can lay claim to one of the world's oldest team sports--the Mesoamerican ball game, called tlachtli by the Aztec, pok-a-tok by the Mayas, and ulama by some other Mexican groups. The game, believed to have originated around 1500 B.C.E., was certainly sport, but it was also an important religious ritual. No one knows whether the Olmecs actually invented the game or if they adopted it from another society, but they were responsible for spreading it to other Mesoamerican cultures. About six hundred ball courts have been found in Mesoamerica, and there are probably many more hidden in the abandoned cities of the jungles.

The ball games were played on large courts with hundreds of spectators watching. The ball courts were often about 120 by 30 feet (36.6 by 9.14 meters) and shaped like the letter I--some courts were even much larger than today's football fields. A big, heavy, solid rubber ball was used, weighing about 6 to 10 pounds (2.72 to 4.54 kilograms). If thrown with force, the ball could seriously injure or even kill a player. Each team tried to score points by getting the ball through stone hoops on the side walls or by causing the other team to drop the ball.

In most versions of the game, only hips, knees, and elbows--no hands or feet--could be used to propel the ball. Players were dressed in uniforms and helmets. At the end of the game, the captain of the defeated team was decapitated as a human sacrifice to the gods. The honor to the winning captain was tremendous and evidently made it worth the risk of playing.

The spectators usually made bets on which team would win; sometimes the stakes were very high--people offered themselves or their relatives as slaves if they lost. In some Mesoamerican cultures, the spectators were obligated to give all their clothing and jewelry to the winning team. Thus, when the crowd saw that a team was making the final winning play, they jumped from their seats and ran away so they wouldn't have to give up their belongings.

The Mesoamerican ball game dramatized the religious principles of the Olmecs and the later civilizations who practiced it. The game was seen as a battle between good and evil--the forces of life and death were being played out on the ball court. The human sacrifice at the game's end was viewed as a way to fertilize the earth or to feed the sun with the victim's blood. Sacrifice of all kinds was crucial in the Mesoamerican religion to ensure that the gods were happy and would not destroy life on Earth or cause crop failures, earthquakes, or volcanoes.

Archaeologists have found what may have been Olmec ball courts in the ruins of San Lorenzo and La Venta. Many detailed scenes depicting the game appear in Olmec art, and rubber balls were found in El Manati. These are the earliest known artifacts of the game.

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