When Did Humans Start Ice Skating?

These people tied bones to their feet to survive winter. Not for fun. For travel, in a land of frozen lakes. When did humans start ice skating? Thousands of years before anyone skated for sport. The first skates were the polished shin bones of horses and cattle, and they were a way to cross frozen lakes instead of trudging all the way around them. In this animated documentary: • Medieval London, c. 1173: teenagers on bone skates, iron-tipped poles, and ice jousting that broke arms and legs • Finland's 188,000 lakes, and why a frozen lake was the best road you had • How to make a bone skate, and why you push with a pole instead of your feet • The 2008 experiment that put volunteers on bone skates and measured every breath • 3,500-year-old bone skates from a tomb in western China, almost identical to Europe's • Why ice is slippery (it's not pressure melting), the Dutch edge that changed everything, and St Lidwina ⏱️ Chapters 0:00 Bones on Their Feet 1:15 A Land of Frozen Lakes 2:27 How to Make a Bone Skate 3:44 The Experiment 5:34 Why Does Ice Even Slide? 6:26 From Survival to Sport 📚 Educational & historical note: This video is for education and entertainment and simplifies complex history and physics. Contested points are flagged on screen: the idea that skating began in southern Finland about 5,000 years ago is one research team's hypothesis (the oldest confidently dated skates are about 4,000 years old), whether the Chinese and European skates share one origin is unknown, and physicists still debate exactly why ice is slippery. Maps and cross-sections are schematic. Sources: • Formenti & Minetti, "The first humans travelling on ice: an energy-saving strategy?", Biological Journal of the Linnean Society (2008) • Formenti & Minetti, "Human locomotion on ice: the evolution of ice-skating energetics through history", Journal of Experimental Biology (2007) • William FitzStephen, Description of London (c. 1173), via the London Museum • Weber et al., "Molecular insight into the slipperiness of ice", Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters (2018) • Xinjiang Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology — bone skates from the Gaotai ruins (2023), reported by Live Science 👉 Subscribe to Stick What If for more history told with stick figures! 💬 Would you cross a frozen lake on two horse bones? #IceSkating #AncientHistory #Animation when did humans start ice skating, history of ice skating, first ice skates, bone skates, ancient ice skates, horse bone skates, finland ice skating origin, formenti minetti bone skates, fitzstephen london skating, medieval ice skating, moorfields skating, bronze age ice skates china, xinjiang bone skates, why is ice slippery, pressure melting myth, dutch ice skates history, st lidwina patron saint of skaters, oldest skis, oldest snowshoe, winter survival history, ancient survival, history animation, stick figure history, stick what if