🪴 GoDeep
Search
← University Challenge
Portrait of The Paralympic Games

General knowledge · Sport

The Paralympic Games

First held Rome, 1960

Sport — international competition for athletes with impairments

The international multi-sport games for athletes with impairments, descended from an archery competition for sixteen injured servicemen and women that Ludwig Guttmann staged at Stoke Mandeville Hospital on 29 July 1948, the day the London Olympics opened. The first Paralympic Games proper were held in Rome in 1960, with 400 athletes from 23 countries. Since Seoul in 1988 they have been held in the same cities as the Olympics, and the name comes not from "paraplegic" but from the Greek para, meaning alongside.

How to spot them

  • ▸The Agitos: three asymmetrical crescents in red, blue and green
  • ▸Stoke Mandeville, Ludwig Guttmann, and an archery contest for wheelchair users in 1948
  • ▸Classification codes such as T11–T13 for visual impairment or S1–S10 in swimming
  • ▸Goalball and boccia, which have no Olympic equivalent

Key facts

Sixteen injured servicemen and women competed at archery at a Buckinghamshire hospital on 29 July 1948 (1948)

Ludwig Guttmann's International Wheelchair Games at Stoke Mandeville, timed for the opening day of the London Olympics

The first Games under the modern name were held in Rome in 1960, with 400 athletes from 23 countries (1960)

Organised in the same city as that year's Olympics

The name is now taken from the Greek for 'alongside', not from 'paraplegic'

Reflecting the widening of the Games beyond spinal injury

Three asymmetrical crescents in red, blue and green, symbolising athletes converging from all over the world

The Agitos, from the Latin agito, 'I move'

The first winter edition was held at Örnsköldsvik in Sweden in 1976 (1976)

Now held every four years, in the same years as the Winter Olympics

Goalball and boccia are contested here and nowhere else at that level

Goalball, for visually impaired athletes, uses a ball with bells inside

The governing body was founded at Düsseldorf on 22 September 1989 (1989)

The International Paralympic Committee, bringing several disability sport organisations together

China topped the medal table at Milano Cortina in 2026 with fifteen golds (2026)

611 athletes from 55 nations in six sports; Italy had their best winter Games, with sixteen medals

Quick-fire facts

  • •The movement began with Ludwig Guttmann's International Wheelchair Games at Stoke Mandeville Hospital on 29 July 1948
  • •The first Paralympic Games were held in Rome in 1960: 400 athletes from 23 countries
  • •The name derives from the Greek preposition para, 'beside' or 'alongside', plus 'Olympic'
  • •The symbol is the Agitos, three asymmetrical crescents in red, blue and green
  • •The first Winter Paralympics were at Örnsköldsvik, Sweden, in 1976
  • •The International Paralympic Committee was founded in Düsseldorf on 22 September 1989
  • •Since Seoul in 1988 the Games have been staged in the same cities and venues as the Olympics
  • •Athletes are grouped by classification, covering ten impairment types including limb deficiency, short stature, visual impairment and intellectual impairment
  • •Goalball and boccia are Paralympic sports with no Olympic counterpart
  • •At Milano Cortina in 2026, China topped the table with fifteen golds and 44 medals; the United States were second

Drill it — 8 cards

1 / 8new card

Sources