Greco-Roman wrestling in the context of "Throw (grappling)"

Wrestling is a martial art, combat sport, and form of entertainment that involves grappling with an opponent and striving to obtain a position of advantage through different throws or techniques, within a given ruleset. Wrestling involves different grappling-type techniques, such as clinch fighting, throws and takedowns, joint locks, pins, and other grappling holds. Many different wrestling techniques have been incorporated into martial arts, combat sports, and military systems.

Wrestling comes in different forms, the most popular being professional wrestling, which is a form of athletic theatre. Other legitimate competitive forms include Greco-Roman, freestyle, judo, sambo, folkstyle, catch, shoot, luta livre, submission, sumo, pehlwani, shuai jiao, and more. Wrestling first appeared in the ancient Olympic Games as an event during the 18th Olympiad in 708 BC. There are a wide range of styles with varying rules, with both traditional historic and modern styles. The term "wrestling" in Modern English originated from the late Old English term wræstlunge.

A combat sport, or fighting sport, is a contact sport that usually involves one-on-one combat. In many combat sports, a contestant wins by scoring more points than the opponent, submitting the opponent with a hold, disabling the opponent (knockout, KO), or attacking the opponent in a specific or designated technique. Combat sports share a long history with the martial arts.

Some combat sports (and their national origin) include boxing (Greek-British), Brazilian jiu-jitsu (Japanese-Brazilian), catch wrestling (British-American), jujutsu (Japanese), judo (Japanese), freestyle wrestling (British-American), Greco-Roman wrestling (French), karate (Chinese-Okinawan-Japanese), kickboxing (numerous origins, mainly Southeast Asian), Lethwei (Burmese), mixed martial arts (numerous origins), Muay Thai (Thai), sambo (Soviet/Russian), sanda (Chinese), savate (French), taekwondo (Korean), Vale Tudo (Brazilian), pankration (Ancient Greek), luta livre (Brazilian), and folk wrestling (various).

Amateur wrestling is a variant of wrestling practiced at Olympic, collegiate, scholastic, and other levels. There are two international wrestling styles performed at the Olympic Games, freestyle and Greco-Roman, both of which are governed by the United World Wrestling (UWW).

At the middle school and high school levels in the United States, wrestlers compete in scholastic wrestling. In collegiate wrestling, there are minor differences in some scholastic wrestling rules.

Freestyle wrestling is a style of wrestling. It is one of two styles of wrestling contested in the Olympic Games, along with Greco-Roman. High school wrestling and men's collegiate wrestling in the United States are conducted under different rules and termed scholastic and collegiate wrestling. U.S. collegiate women's wrestling is conducted under freestyle rules.

Freestyle wrestling, like collegiate wrestling, has its origins in catch-as-catch-can wrestling. In both styles, the ultimate goal is to throw and pin the opponent to the mat, which results in an immediate win. Unlike Greco-Roman, freestyle and collegiate wrestling allow the use of the wrestler's or the opponent's legs in offense and defense.

Sambo is a combat sport, and a recognized style of amateur wrestling governed by the UWW in the World Wrestling Championships along with Greco-Roman wrestling and freestyle wrestling. Practiced worldwide, sambo is a martial art with Soviet origins. Many of its techniques have been incorporated into other combat sports such as mixed martial arts.

Collegiate wrestling, commonly referred to as folkstyle wrestling, is the form of wrestling practiced at the post-secondary level in the United States. This style of wrestling is also practiced at the high school, middle school, and elementary levels with some modifications.

The rules and style of collegiate/folkstyle wrestling differ from the Olympic styles of freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling. Collegiate and freestyle wrestling, unlike Greco-Roman, also both allow the use of the wrestler's or their opponent's legs in offense and defense. There are collegiate wrestling programs in almost all U.S. states, and one university in Canada.

Catch wrestling (also known as catch-as-catch-can) is an English wrestling style with fewer restrictions than other wrestling styles. It allows techniques using or targeting the legs (unlike Greco-Roman wrestling), it allows joint locks (unlike freestyle wrestling and Greco-Roman wrestling), and there are no mandatory grips. It was spread by wrestlers of travelling funfairs who developed their own submission holds, referred to as "hooks" and "stretches", into their wrestling to increase their effectiveness against their opponents, as well as immigrants through Europe and the Anglosphere.

Catch-as-catch-can was included in the 1904 Olympic Games and continued through the 1936 Games; it had new rules and weight categories introduced similar to other amateur wrestling styles, and dangerous moves – including all submission holds – were banned. At the amateur level, FILA developed and codified new rules and regulations to replace catch wrestling with freestyle wrestling, which was then considered separate from the dangerous, professional catch style. After a revival effort starting in the 1980s, competitive catch wrestling gradually made a return, leading to The Snake Pit's Catch Wrestling World Championships and notable competitions such as the Snake Pit British Championships and ACWA US Open.

Wrestling at the Olympic Games was contested at the first modern Olympics, in the form of Greco-Roman wrestling, held in Athens in 1896. Wrestling would appear at every Summer Olympics held since then, with the exception of the 1900 Summer Olympics when wrestling did not appear on the program. Freestyle wrestling (or catch-as-catch-can wrestling as it was called prior to the 1924 Summer Olympics) and weight classes both made their first appearance at the 1904 Summer Olympics. Women's freestyle wrestling competition was first held at the 2004 Summer Olympics.

In 2013, the IOC voted to drop wrestling from the Summer Olympic program. The president of the sport's governing body, FILA (now United World Wrestling), resigned after a subsequent motion of no confidence, and several of the FILA leadership followed suit. After new leadership stepped in and revisions to the program for the 2016 Summer Olympics (including rule changes and additional women's competitions), wrestling successfully campaigned to be readmitted back onto the Summer Olympic program.