Dr.Hab., PhD, Associate Professor A.A. Peredel'skiy
Postgraduate A. Kirtuake
Russian State University of Physical Culture, Sport, Youth and Tourism, Moscow

Keywords: agonic sport traditions, Romanian-Moldovan ethno-social universe, Greco-Roman wrestling.

Introduction

The world history gives us many cases when something foreign implanted into a national soil enroots in it, brings fruit and soon is commonly accepted as something old and native. It is the global social and cultural mechanisms and phenomena like capital, political forms, world religions, art, sports etc. that are particularly flexible and adaptable in this sense. The situation is even more favorable when the imported foreign cultural forms find the alike local forms in place that may be supportive and nutritional for them. In such cases, the synthesis of the national and international content in one form may evolve into particularly strong and viable systems. It has always been well understood by many conquerors, politicians and religious leaders. It is now secret, for instance, that the Manchurian and Tatar dynasties of conquerors and rulers of China were very fast and enthusiastic in adapting to and accepting the Chinese cultural traditions, values and lifestyle, and only somewhat renewed their content in a few cases. Acting in much the same way were the Christian religious hierarchs striving to enroot Christianity in the pagans’ lands. No wonder that a close scrutiny of any Christian holiday easily reveals its ancient pagan origins and precursors.

Sports are undoubtedly no exclusion in this process. It is a matter of common knowledge that the modern sports have always been faster and better adopted by those nations and countries which had their own alike ancient competitive traditions and practices in place. The Scandinavian nations might be a good case in point with their winter sport traditions and competitions that were used as a basis for the modern Winter Olympic Games in fact [A.V. Treskin, N.Y. Mel'nikova, 2008].

Objective of the study was to make a historical analysis of the hierarchy of national and international dominants in the modern Moldavian wrestling sport development in the context of the international Greco-Roman wrestling traditions.

Study results and discussion. An insight to the history of the Moldovan national sport traditions reveals at least three to five national competitive practices that provided a very organic substrate for quite a few modern sport disciplines including track and field sports, weightlifting, fencing, Greco-Roman and freestyle wrestling etc. It was apparently the synthesis of the local and foreign wrestling traditions that gave rise to the most healthy and viable forms of the modern Moldovan wrestling sport culture, with the natural preference (in terms of the key qualitative and quantitative progress indicators) being given to the Moldovan school of Greco-Roman and freestyle wrestling sports. It might be unreasonable or, to be more exact, premature to refer to the Moldovan school of Greco-Roman wrestling (as opposed to freestyle wrestling) as a special style, but the importance of Greco-Roman wrestling and its priority role throughout all the Moldovan sport history as well as its greatest potential (together with freestyle wrestling) that need to be tapped by the Physical Culture and Sports Anti-crisis Development Program of the Moldovan Republic – shall not be underestimated nor overlooked.

The high promise and viability of Greco-Roman wrestling viewed as one of a few backbone sports by the Physical Culture and Sports Anti-crisis Development Program of the Moldovan Republic are due to the following factors: first, to the traditional ethno-cultural roots and historic connections with the people of Romania where this wrestling style has always been favoured and developed, and, second, to the long history of the Moldovan sport as a part of the Soviet sport system and contributor to its fundamental achievements in many sports, including Greco-Roman wrestling where the Soviet wrestlers were always ranked among the leaders of world sport. Let us consider this recent history in more detail.

It may be pertinent to take and analyze the Olympic records of the Romanian, Soviet and Russian Greco-Roman wrestlers and use these analytical data to outline the progress vector(s) of the Moldavian Greco-Roman wrestling school. Moreover, it might be also beneficial to give due attention to the accomplishments of the Greco-Roman wrestlers from a few neighbouring countries including Hungary, Bulgaria, Poland, Turkey and Greece – in view of their geographic, historical and cultural closeness to Moldova in many aspects.

The history of Greco-Roman wrestling as an Olympic sport discipline was brilliantly and comprehensively analyzed by the authors (under leadership of A.G. Semenov and M.V. Prokhorova) of “Greco-Roman Wrestling” Manual popular in this part of the world (A.G. Semenov, M.V. Prokhorova et al., 2005). The authors analyzed variations in the centres of dominance, influences and priorities in the Olympic Greco-Roman (classical) wrestling sport history starting from the 1904 (III) Summer Olympic Games in Sent-Louis when the rules of the competitions were unfairly changed to promote the so-called freestyle wrestling and thereby favour the hosts and help them win all the prizes.

It was for a variety of political and other reasons that the Soviet and Romanian wrestlers entered the high-level competitions no sooner than after the World War II.

Before that happened, leading in this sport discipline were the Germans, Swedes, Finns, Estonians, Hungarians, Turks and Italians. It was only at the 1947 (XV) Summer Olympics in Helsinki that the Soviet Union showed up with a full team of 8 wrestlers. Representing Romania at these Games was a team of seven wrestlers. The national USSR team was proud to come first in the team total score ahead of the national teams of Hungary and Sweden. Next time at the 1956 (XVI) Summer Olympic Games in Melbourne, the national USSR team in Greco-Roman (classical) wrestling was again highly successful having won 5 golden, 1 silver and 1 bronze medal and having left behind the Finns and wrestlers from other leading countries. At the 1960 (XVII) Summer Olympic Games in Rome, the USSR Greco-Roman wrestling team was the first again in the unofficial team total score, followed by the Turkish team and, for the first time, the Romanian team. At the 1964 (XVIII) Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo and the next 1968 (XIX) Summer Olympic Games in Mexico, the first three places on the unofficial team total scoreboard were won by the USSR, Bulgaria and Hungary, respectively; and the first three team total places at the 1972 (XX) Summer Olympic Games in Munich were taken by the USSR, Bulgarian and Romanian teams, respectively. The team wins at the 1976 (XXI) Summer Olympic Games in Montreal were again celebrated by the USSR, Bulgarian and Romanian teams, respectively. At the next 1980 (XXII) Summer Olympic Games in Moscow, ranked second and third after the USSR wrestling team were the Hungarian and Bulgarian teams, although a Romanian wrestler S. Rus won the first prize in the light welterweight.

At the 1984 (XXIII) Summer Olympic Games in Los-Angeles, when the Soviet team was excluded from the competitions, it was Y. Draka from the Romanian wrestling team who won the Olympic Champion title. The USSR wrestling team restored its unofficial team leadership at the 1988 (XXIV) Summer Olympic Games in Seoul in the Greco-Roman wrestling competitions. Next time at the 1992 (XXV) Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona, the leaders’ group changed its name to the CIS wrestling team and it was the first again in the team total score.

After the relatively unsuccessful performance at the 1996 (XXVI) Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta, the Russian national wrestling team came back to the first team total place at the 2000 (XXVII) Summer Olympic Games in Sydney, and then defended its informal leadership at the 2004 (XXVIII) Summer Olympic Games in Athens where the Russian wrestlers won the top prizes to prove once again the Russia’s role as a decent successor of the Soviet Greco-Roman wrestling school in competing on the global arenas.

Accomplishments of the Romanian wrestlers for the same period have not been that impressive, albeit they have firmly remained among the top competitors in the title fights. More recent Olympic Game history under the analysis have also demonstrated time and again the power of the Russian Greco-Roman wrestling school, and the demonstration was so striking that an unfair attempt was made to call in question the Olympic status of this sport discipline (this version of the event is no less sound than the others in our opinion).

In the context of the above analysis, it may be pertinent to question if there is something special that can be said about the Moldovan wrestlers? Are there some special traits or accomplishments that single out the Moldovan school of Greco-Roman wrestling sport that has long been under a series of influences from the Greek, Turkish, again Greek, “general Balkan”, Soviet/ Russian and the Romanian wrestling traditions? Now, having the broader historical retrospective and analytical data, we feel that it might be beneficial to assess the “general progress and development trends” (as provided by the authors of the above-mentioned popular “Greco-Roman Wrestling” Manual) in application to the Moldavian wrestling tradition.

As far as the social and ontological factors of global influence on the Greco-Roman wrestling sport the world over are concerned, they are traditionally listed as follows:

• Favorable conditions (created by the “capitalist” system) for the wrestling sport being formally recognized by many European nations on the whole and France in particular;

• Great contribution of the local sport enthusiasts in the efforts to promote and develop their national wrestling schools. As a good case in point, we would mention the group of amateur wrestlers and athletes established by Doctor V.F. Krasovskiy in Russia in 1885;

• Renewed interest to the Greco-Roman wrestling sport and emergence of many competing schools representing the both opposite political systems, with the USSR, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia, GDR, Mongolia, China and Cuba on the one side; and the USA, Great Britain, France, Italy, FRG, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Finland etc. - on the other side. (We mention herein only the nations having their own national Greco-Roman wrestling schools); and

• Breakdown of the USSR in 1991 quite often considered among the key factors that “gave an impetus for the Greco-Roman wrestling sport being expanded all over the world”. “The newly independent countries that were in the USSR system before the collapse had to show up with their national teams at the largest international events”, as stated by the authors of the above “Greco-Roman Wrestling” Manual (A.G. Semenov, M.V. Prokhorova et al., 2005, p. 49-50).

How the above factors have or could have influenced the Moldovan Greco-Roman wrestling school? This question can only be answered based on more detailed and special empirical data analysis – that is beyond the frame of this article at this juncture.

Let us come straight to the analysis of the key global trends in the Greco-Roman (classical) wrestling system establishment and development process and see how they manifest themselves and can act, in particular, in the present crisis situation faced by the physical culture and sports sector of the Republic of Moldova.

• “Greco-Roman wrestling sport grows in parallel with and when the economic and cultural relationships are on the plentiful rise” [GRW Manual, p. 50].

• “It is the growing science and industry that provides a basis for the progress of Greco-Roman wrestling sport” [GRW Manual, p. 50].

• “Olympic movement heavily contributes to the Greco-Roman wrestling sport development process” [GRW Manual, p. 51].

• “Evolution of rules directly affects the wrestling sport expansion and development process by making the sport more dynamic, entertaining and democratic and encouraging its technical and tactical development aspects [GRW Manual, p. 52].

• “Establishment and progress of the Greco-Roman wrestling as an Olympic sport discipline largely depends on how successful the staff training process is” [GRW Manual, p. 53].

• “Mass media organizations may facilitate progress of Greco-Roman wrestling as a sport discipline” [GRW Manual, p. 53].

Conclusion

Based on the above provisions and findings, we have come close to the key model design specifications of the modern anti-crisis Greco-Roman wrestling sport development version for the Republic of Moldova. These specifications, however, would be incomplete and inaccurate unless supported by a progress analysis of the Moldovan freestyle school history that generally shows the local sport being deeper connected (compared to the Greco-Roman wrestling traditions) with the national Moldovan wrestling traditions.

It should be noted in this context, however, that the internationally accepted freestyle wrestling sport tradition (in contrast to the “western” Greco-Roman wrestling) rather gravitates to the Turkish and other eastern national sport traditions. Anyway, the hierarchies of the national and international determinants of the agonic Moldavian sport traditions in the process appear to be more governed by the international determinants in fact.

References

1. Greko-rimskaya bor'ba: uchebnik (Greco-Roman wrestling: textbook) / Ed. by A.G. Semenov, M.V. Prokhorova. – Moscow: Olimpiya Press, Terra Sport, 2005. – 256 p.
2. Peredel'skiy A.A. Religiozno-politicheskie osnovaniya agonal'no-sportivnoy traditsii i ikh vliyanie na teoriyu i metodiku sportivnogo obrazovaniya (Religious and political grounds of agonic sport tradition and their influence on theory and methodology of sport education) / A.A. Peredel'skiy, A. Kirtuake // Teoriya i praktika fizicheskoy kultury. – 2014. – № 10. – P. 34–36.
3. Peredel'skiy A.A. Fizicheskaya kul'tura i sport v sovremennykh usloviyakh: edinstvo i mnogoobrazie (Physical culture and sport in modern conditions: unity and diversity) / A.A. Peredel'skiy // Teoriya i praktika fizicheskoy kultury. – 2011. – № 9. – P. 101–104.
4. Peredel'skiy A.A. Formirovanie nravstvennogo i dukhovnogo zdorov'ya lichnosti sredstvami fizicheskoy i sportivnoy kul'tury: nauka v pomoshch ideologii (Formation of moral and spiritual health of individual by means of physical and sports culture: science to maintain ideology) / A.A. Peredel'skiy // Vestnik sportivnoy nauki. – 2012. – № 2. – P. 53–56.

Corresponding author: alisa.gorba4eva@yandex.ru

Abstract

The problem of hierarchical dependence of modern Moldovan sport on the international traditions of Greco-Roman wrestling was considered in the study. There were at least 3-5 kinds of traditional national competitive practices in the history of the Moldovan people. These practices served a very organic "base" for such sports as athletics, weightlifting, fencing, classical and freestyle wrestling. The Moldovan sports culture was especially efficiently and well established on the basis of the combination of "domestic" and "foreign" wrestling traditions.

As seen from analysis of the main international laws of formation and development of Greco-Roman (classical) wrestling in the Republic of Moldova, Greco-Roman wrestling is developing along with the rapid growth of economic and cultural relations," "development of science and industry leads to the development of Greco-Roman wrestling," Greco-Roman wrestling is developing "under the influence of the Olympic Movement", the "evolution of the rules has a direct impact on the development and establishment of wrestling, giving it dynamics, making it spectacular and democratic, enriching it technically and tactically", ensuring the "dependence of the development and establishment of Greco-Roman wrestling as an Olympic sport on personnel training", the "influence of the media on the development of Greco-Roman wrestling as a sport. "