Some would say soccer is the most popular game in the world; we are not sure about that, but it is definitely one of the oldest. Soccer ball history is in fact the history of soccer. When talking about soccer ball history there are several periods to distinguish. Thus there are the early ball history, the balls in the 1800s, balls in the 1900s, and the modern times.
Early soccer ball history starts before the birth of Christ. Kicking a round object for fun was surely a pastime to many cultures. Indians in South America are known to have used a light elasticized ball, which is amazing since rubber started being produced only a few thousand years later. The early soccer balls consisted of different items from human and animal skulls to pig or cow bladders and wrapped up cloth. Between 255 BC and 220 AD, the Chinese played ‘tsu chu’ using animal-skin balls dribbled through gaps in a net stretched between two poles. Ancient Romans and Greeks also had a game which involved carrying and kicking a ball, whereas in certain ancient Egyptian rites are said to have had similarities with soccer.
Pre-medieval and medieval legends and stories that can be considered as part of the soccer ball history, also mention the use of animal bladders or skulls to play games similar to modern soccer. There is a story about people in two villages playing with a ball. An entire village used to kick a skull along a path to a nearby village square. The other villagers will make similar attempts. Inflated animal bladders seem to dominate this part of the soccer ball history. They used to inflate them and then try to keep the ‘ball’ in the air by by means of both feet and hands. In time people improvements to the shape and strength of the ball were brought by covering it with leather.
The soccer ball history of the 1800s was marked by the 1836 patenting of vulcanized rubber by Charles Goodyear. In 1855 the same Charles Goodyear designed and then built the first vulcanized rubber soccer balls. In 1862 H.J. Lindon came up with with a prototype for the first inflatable soccer ball bladders. Although he is the father of the rugby ball too, he did not patent the idea at the time because of the preference for the round ball. By the 1900s the soccer ball history had entered on a different path, bringing these entertainment objects a lot closer to what they are today.
