History of ice hockey

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Ice hockey is believed to have evolved from simple stick and ball games played in the 18th and 19th centuries in Britain, Ireland, and elsewhere, primarily bandy, hurling, and shinty. The North American sport of lacrosse was also influential. These games were brought to North America and several similar winter games using informal rules developed, such as shinny and ice polo, but were later absorbed into a new organized game with codified rules which today is ice hockey.

In 2024, it was noted that the post-internet discoveries of other hockey-like games have buried modern ice hockey’s true “lineal” origins.^[1] Mark Grant noted that Montreal inherited a singular version of hockey on ice that was transferred from Halifax in 1872 or 1873. This version of hockey led to the extinction of all other hockey-like games, for being based on a superior stick, the Kjipuktuk Mi'kmaw's “flat thin-blade” stick, which "tamed the puck," and Dartmouth-Canada's Acme skate, "which leveraged the skater and weaponized turning." Grant argued that all other ‘hockey’ games should not be confused with the “Halifax-Montreal” game and were “non-lineal” games that are ancillary to modern ice hockey’s true narrative. He wrote that "these other games were all "background performers in an epic story of conquest that co-starred Halifax and Montreal."^[2][3]