Skin in the game in the ancient Greece | #DailyBlink58
Over the entrance to a small palestra — a wrestling school — in ancient Greece was emblazoned this short phrase: Strip or Retire.
During this period, men competed in sports and exercised in the nude. Thus the inscription served as a challenge to each man entering the gymnasium: come in, participate, and struggle — or keep out. Mere spectators were not welcome.
To be part of this wrestling school, you were literally required to put your skin in the game.
In antiquity, such a requirement extended far beyond athletics; a man could not participate in civic life, business transactions, war, or philosophical debates unless he had metaphorical skin in the game — unless he was willing to risk his life, and what was even more valuable, his honor.
Lesson here.
