

Kenth Hansen, International Society of Olympic Historians, "The Birth of Swedish Ice Hockey – Antwerp 1920", Journal of Olympic History ( JOH, formerly Citius, Altius, Fortius) Thus there were a number of different games played on skates with a stick and ball and with varying rules in America before ice hockey was invented. You could find similar games there, played by immigrants (chiefly Dutch) and by Indians. From the Fen district the game was spread to London and from London to the Continent during the second half of the 19th century.īritish soldiers stationed in eastern Canada brought the game to the North American continent in the 1850's and '60's. Just as for practically all other sports, the game of bandy achieved its modern form during the 19th century in England, more exactly in the Fen district on the East coast. The origin of ice hockey was bandy, a game that has its roots in the Middle Ages. These games were brought to North America and several similar winter games using informal rules developed, such as shinny and ice polo, but would later be absorbed into a new organized game with codified rules which today is ice hockey. Arguably the games most influential to the early design of ice hockey were early forms of an organized sport today known as bandy, a sport distinctly separate from ice hockey. The North American sport of lacrosse was also influential. Ice hockey is believed to have evolved from simple stick and ball games played in the 18th and 19th centuries in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and elsewhere, primarily bandy, hurling, and shinty.
#Eis hockey professional
5.3 History of professional women players.5.2 History of Women's World Championship.The first IIHF Women's World Championship was held in 1990, and women's play was introduced into the Olympics in 1998. While women also played during the game's early formative years, it was not until organizers began to officially remove body checking from female ice hockey beginning in the mid-1980s that it began gain greater popularity, which by then had spread to Finland and a variety of other countries. The sport was played for the first time at the Olympics during the 1920 Summer Olympics.

In the early 1900s, the Canadian rules were adopted by the Ligue Internationale de Hockey Sur Glace, in Paris, France, the precursor of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF). The Stanley Cup, emblematic of ice hockey club supremacy, was initially commissioned in 1892 as the "Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup" and was first awarded in 1893 to recognize the Canadian amateur champion and later became the championship trophy of the NHL. Amateur ice hockey leagues began in the 1880s, and professional ice hockey originated around 1900. Some characteristics of that game, such as the length of the ice rink and the use of a puck, have been retained to this day. The modern sport of ice hockey was developed in Canada, most notably in Montreal, where the first indoor game was played on March 3, 1875. The sport of lacrosse was considered the national sport of Canada until 1994 but is now considered the country's official national summer sport while ice hockey is considered its official national winter sport. However, in many countries, "hockey" usually refers to field hockey, except in some Northern areas of Russia where bandy is still referred to as "Russian hockey" (русский хоккей) or "hockey with a ball" (xоккей с мячом), while ice hockey is called "hockey with a puck" (xоккей с шайбой). In North America and some European countries the sport is known simply as "hockey" in common parlance. Ice hockey is one of the sports featured in the Winter Olympics while its premiere international amateur competition, the IIHF World Championships, are governed by the International Ice Hockey Federation for both men's and women's competitions. In a formal game, each team has six skaters on the ice at a time, barring any penalties, one of whom is the goaltender. The team which scores the most goals is declared the winner.


In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hockey sticks to control, advance and shoot a closed, vulcanized, rubber disc called a " puck" into the other team's goal. Ice hockey is a contact winter team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport.
