July 27th, 2010 
Product Description
Detailing the evolution of the Hellenic combat arts, this handbook chronicles the history behind the art of pankration. Beginning with the myths and traditions behind the art’s development, this examination also touches on pankration’s modern methodology and techniques, fully explained in illustrative photographs and easy-to-follow captions. Revealing and informative, this exploration is a must-have for mixed martial arts and pankration practitioners as well as Ultimate Fighting Championship fans.
The First Mixed Martial Art: Pankration from Myths to Modern Times
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This is an absolutely wonderful book that provides a wealth of information concerning the historical background of Pankration, while dispelling a lot of myths that surround this ancient Western martial art. The vast majority of the book is spent giving you a lot of historical background and it even gives you a list of Olympic winners at the very end of the book. Although the author does spend a significant portion of the book demonstrating some of the techniques of Pankration, I don’t feel that this really adds anything to the book, although it certainly doesn’t take anything away from it.
The main focus of the book is on the historical background and that is where its strength lies. The techniques shown are ones that you could see in any number of different martial arts technique oriented books and don’t really go into a lot of detail on how to execute the techniques other than the obligatory for sentences. This however shouldn’t have any bearing at all on this book as it was nice to see some examples of the the various techniques demonstrated, but in my opinion it wasn’t really necessary since the remaining portions of the book were so well done.
So if you are looking to gain some wonderful insight into the latest Pankration technique I think you will be very disappointed. However, if you are looking to “train your brain” and obtain some outstanding and significant historical knowledge on this very important and historically significant Western martial art, then this is definitely the book for you.
I can not recommend this book highly enough and I guarantee you that you will not be disappointed with the information contained within its pages.
Shawn Kovacich
Martial Artist/Krav Maga Instructor
Author of the Achieving Kicking Excellence series.
Rating: 5 / 5
This review is a wonderful traversal of the evolution of Greek Martial Art from pre-history (the mythological period) to modern times. The text is second to none. The techniques presented as the modern evolution of Pankration are outstanding. This is a true tribute to my ancestors. I recommend this book to anyone interested in MMA, Greek martial art, western martial art, or just advancing “their game”.
-Iraklis Vounidis
Rating: 5 / 5