Chinlone

As spectators of chinlone, Europeans derisively deemed it to be merely an entertaining game of indigenous people, too passive and not violent or masculine enough to be considered a sport.

From the 1960s onward, the government strongly promoted traditional and historical preservation in an effort to renew native cultural pride.

The head of the Burma Athletic Association, U Ah Yein, was ordered by the Burmese government to write a rulebook for chinlone in 1953.

While chinlone does distinctively go back far into Burmese tradition, there are many similar sports closely related to it across many other Southeast Asian countries, such as da cau (Vietnam), kator (Laos), sepak raga (Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and Indonesia), sipa (Philippines) and takraw (Thailand).

[4]At the 2013 SEA Games in Myanmar, chinlone made its debut as a contested sport and was also featured in the closing ceremony.

In the South African football comic Supa Strikas, an episode, No El' in Team, featured chinlone in the story arc.

Chinlone players in Loikaw ( Myanmar ).
One of the first photographs of men playing chinlone, taken around 1899
Watercolor painting of a chinlone game from the 19th century.