Glima

Last updated: July 11, 2026

What is glima?

Glima is the wrestling tradition of the Norse world. The Vikings who settled Iceland in the 9th and 10th centuries carried their wrestling with them, and the practice took hold there more firmly than anywhere else in Scandinavia. The name itself is debated. Some trace it to an Old Norse word for a glimpse or flash, a nod to the speed of the movements, while others link it to an older term meaning gladness or joy.

For the Norse, glima was more than sport. Children learned it, adults competed at feasts, and warriors fell back on its grips and throws when a fight closed to grappling range or a weapon was lost. What separates glima from most wrestling is its insistence on staying upright and winning through skill instead of muscle. A wrestler is meant to unbalance an opponent cleanly, not bulldoze them over. That principle still shapes the sport, and it is why a lighter, more technical wrestler can beat a bigger one.

How glima works

In its standard competitive form, two wrestlers face off wearing leather harnesses: a belt around the waist and a strap around each thigh, linked together. Each takes a fixed grip, one hand on the belt and one on the thigh strap, and keeps it for the whole bout. Modern competitors also wear special shoes.

From there, the match runs on a few firm rules. Both wrestlers stand straight, and bending at the waist to muscle an opponent is banned as a fault. They step clockwise around each other in a constant motion, the Icelanders call stígandi, which keeps the bout flowing and stops it stalling into a shoving contest. Wrestlers are expected to look over the opponent’s shoulder rather than down at the feet, because glima is meant to be wrestled by feel.

A wrestler wins by making the opponent touch the ground with any part of the body between the elbow and the knee. Forcing someone over with a shove goes against the spirit of the sport. The whole system is built on eight core techniques, called bragð, which branch out into roughly fifty documented ways to trip and throw. Around all of it sits a code of honour, drengskapur, that expects fairness and real care for a training partner’s safety.

The three styles of glima

Rather than one fixed set of rules, glima covers a family of related styles. Three forms are recognised, and they differ mostly in how wrestlers grip and how much aggression the rules permit.

Style	Meaning	How it works	Character
Brókartök	Trouser-grip	Fixed grip on the belt and thigh straps, upright and technical	The sporting standard and Iceland’s national form
Hryggspenna	Backhold	Wrestlers lock arms around each other’s upper body	More a contest of raw strength than finesse
Lausatök	Loose-grip	Any grip allowed, much more aggressive	The basis of self-defence and combat glima

Brókartök is what most people picture when they think of glima, and it is the version fought for Iceland’s championship. Lausatök sits at the other end. It permits almost any hold, can continue after a wrestler hits the ground, and is still taught as a self-defence system in parts of Norway, Sweden, and Finland.

Glima vs modern wrestling and MMA grappling

For anyone who follows grappling, glima looks familiar and foreign at the same time. The throws and trips would fit into a judo or wrestling gym, but the rules around them are unusual.

The clearest difference is posture. Freestyle and folkstyle wrestlers change levels, shoot for the legs, and drop low to defend. In glima, that bent, low stance is illegal. Wrestlers stay tall for the entire bout, which removes the level changes and scrambles that define modern wrestling.

The next difference is the ground. Brazilian jiu-jitsu and MMA grappling live on the mat, where guard passing and submissions do the real work. Sport glima ends the instant a wrestler lands, so there is no ground game at all. The aggressive lausatök form breaks that pattern, since it can carry on after the fall and includes strikes and locks, which is why it reads more like a battlefield system than a modern sport.

	Glima (sport)	Folkstyle / freestyle wrestling	BJJ / MMA grappling
Posture	Upright, bending banned	Level changes, low stance	Any, often on the ground
Grip	Fixed belt-and-thigh harness	Any hold on the body	Any grip, gi or no-gi
Ground fighting	None, the fall ends the match	Pins on the mat	Central to the art
How you win	Opponent touches ground elbow-to-knee	Pin or points	Submission or points

Origins and history

Wrestling shows up in Iceland from the moment it was settled, and glima grew out of it over the following centuries. One appealing theory holds that two traditions merged on the island: a Norwegian style with no foot tricks and an Irish style that used them, combining into something new. The oldest written trace appears in the Jónsbók law book of 1325, which noted that anyone joining a friendly wrestling match did so at their own risk.

Glima faded across most of Scandinavia as society changed and foreign sports arrived, yet Iceland’s isolation kept it alive. Icelandic nationalists in the early 20th century took it up as a symbol of identity. The first modern trouser-grip competition ran in 1888, the leather belt was added in 1905, and the Grettir Belt, still the prize for the national champion, was first awarded in 1906. Trouser-grip glima has been Iceland’s national sport for over a century, and it even appeared as a demonstration event at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics.

Common misconceptions

A few ideas about glima come up often and miss the mark. Television is one source. The fights in shows like Vikings and Vikings: Valhalla owe far more to modern stage combat and MMA choreography than to glima, so they paint a misleading picture of how Norse wrestling actually looked.

Another is that glima is a dead historical curiosity. It is a living sport with active competitions in Iceland and clubs across Norway, Sweden, Finland, and beyond. A third is that it amounts to plain wrestling with a Viking label slapped on. The upright posture and the constant clockwise stepping, along with the ban on shoving an opponent over, mark it out from nearly every other folk wrestling style in the world.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does the word glima mean?

The meaning is uncertain. One reading traces it to an Old Norse word for a glimpse or flash, describing the quick movements. Another links it to an older term meaning gladness or joy.

Is glima still practised today?

Yes. It is the national sport of Iceland, contested every year, and it has active clubs in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and several other countries.

Did the Vikings use glima in real combat?

Grappling skill mattered when a fight closed to arm’s length or a warrior lost a weapon. The self-defence side of glima, later formalised as lausatök, drew on that reality.

Can you learn glima outside Iceland?

Yes. The loose-grip lausatök form, in particular, is taught as a martial art in Norway, Sweden, and Finland, and interest has spread to clubs in the United States and elsewhere.

Is glima the same as Viking wrestling?

They refer to the same thing. “Viking wrestling” is the popular English name for glima, the wrestling the Norse settlers brought to Iceland.

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Sources

1. Wikipedia. “Glíma.” Accessed July 2026.
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gl%C3%ADma
2. Hurstwic. “Glíma: UNESCO Application.” Accessed July 2026.
   http://www.hurstwic.com/library/glima/index.htm
3. Iceland Review. “From the Archive: The Ancient Art of Glíma.” Accessed July 2026.
   https://www.icelandreview.com/magazine/from-the-archive-the-ancient-art-of-glima/
4. Martial Journal. “Spotlight: Glima Grandmaster Lars Magnar Enoksen.” Accessed July 2026.
   https://www.martialjournal.com/martial-journal-spotlight-glima-grandmaster-lars-magnar-enoksen/
5. EJMAS. Kautz, W. “The Gripping History of Glima.” Accessed July 2026.
   https://ejmas.com/jwma/articles/2000/jwmaart_kautz_0100.htm
6. Sports & Hobbies. “What Is Glima?” Accessed July 2026.
   https://www.sportsnhobbies.org/what-is-glima.htm
7. Iceland’s Glima Association. Accessed July 2026.
   http://www.glima.is/

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