Introduction

All these aspects have been addressed by the author in a companion volume, Cockfighting in Britain from Antiquity to the Enlightenment. Together, the chapters in that study explore the culture, significance and purpose of cockfighting, the sport’s impact on society, its political and economic dimensions, how cultural and societal changes influence its practices. The central premise of that study is that cockfighting remained an integral part of British culture for nigh on two millennia because of the cock’s enduring association with the Church, and the patronage of elite sections of society who took pleasure in participating in cockfighting, having imbued it with an honourable pedigree traced back to Ancient Greece and Rome.