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History of Exercise

 

 

The history of exercise dates back to the birth of humankind, though earlier humans might not have realized that they were indeed exercising, when running for their lives from wooly mammoths. In and around 400 BC, Hippocrates famously mentioned about exercise, "If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise, not too little and not too much, we would have found the safest way to health." Being a time of great ideas and new thought, people seriously started to study the importance and relevance of physical exercise, and its effects on human health. Hippocrates's same thoughts were shared by other famous thinkers, Cornelius Celsus and Galen, a few centuries later.

 

But when exactly various systematic forms of exercise routines came into being as an artificial means to build muscles and agility, this is a piece of puzzle that is still shrouded in anonymity.  History pages, even though it refrains from throwing up any specific piece of info on this point, vaguely suggests that such practices could have been popular in ancient Rome, Greece and India in the 9-11th centuries where combats and wars were of regular occurrence. The discovery of stone dumbbell weights in India and similar artifacts from Europe also points to such a possibility. 

 

The workout routines or exercises, as we all see it today, shaped up however since only the early 18th century. This was when exercises became more streamlined and better and efficient workout routines were suggested, thanks to the rapid strides that occurred in medicine and science in general. It was during this period that aerobics, weight lifting, weight training, running, and other similar conventional exercise forms evolved, and gymnasiums and fitness centers became popular. The 18th century was also the period during when many wrong myths about exercise and health were busted by the new found wave of scientific justification. Wrong beliefs such as weight training slow down athletes, endurance training not a healthy proportion to one



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