In 1993 the first ever Ultimate Fighting Championship event was held. Perhaps the most import moment in mixed martial arts history and a fitting focus for the first episode of Bloody Elbow's ambitious new MMA history series "Pankronicles."
While many point to this event as the beginning of mixed martial arts, that isn't correct. The "sport" had existed long before that. Some 2500 years ago Ancient Greece had their own version of mixed martial arts known as pankration, which translates as "all powers" or perhaps more accurately as "anything goes". Pankration would eventually fade away with the end of the classical world but other sports that could be called MMA, even if they didn't use that name, would arise from time to time.