Whatever is the case, handball had founded its international federation in the summer of the post-war year, but the history of the sport is much older. The ancient Greeks knew a game related to handball and named it Urania, while the Romans called handball Harpaston - there is evidence for both forms of play, the current ones can be found 800 years BC. Games similar to handball can also be found from the Middle Ages, as German Walter von der Vogelweide sang about them, and they are played in today's Italy, South Tyrol, Switzerland, Ireland, England and France. And even in the far north, the Inuit toss the balls with their hands - whether with or without gloves is not documented.

However, handball in its present form developed almost in parallel in at least three countries, in Sweden, Denmark and Germany and the end of the 19th century. That is why the three people like to claim that they invented the sport. The fact is that the Dane Holger Nielsen and the German Konrad Koch laid down the first rules, and actually - at least as the IHF composed them - several forefathers helped give birth to two babies at the same time - field handball and indoor handball, at that time more likely called small-field handball .

You can take that with the many fathers literally, there was goalball, Königsbergball, the Wiesbaden goalball game, Ceska Hazena, Uruguayan Balon - in short, the world was ripe for a new sport. And so it was only a matter of time before the Berliners Max Heiser and Carl Schelenz set rules that still shape the game to this day in its basics. The fact that it would take more than 20 years before the handball players founded their own international federation is due to contemporary history, because like other ball sports, handball first slipped under the umbrella of the IAAF, the international athletics federation, in 1926.

Two years later there was a more or less independent department called the IAHF, which may possibly be seen as the forerunner of the IHF. That happened in 1928, around the Olympic Games in Amsterdam and famous US -American Avery Brundage was one of the fathers of the organization. By the way, basketball said goodbye to the IAHF in 1934.

Though Brundage later was elected IOC President, the relationship between handball and the Olympic Games was disturbed for a long time. In 1936, field handball celebrated its Olympic premiere in Berlin. The first indoor handball world championship was played in 1938, of course in Germany and of course the hosts also became world champions. It was a 4-nation tournament and the World Cup lasted from Friday to Sunday.

That has changed a bit since then. Today, handball is a global sport, which is not due to around 200 IHF member countries, but above all to the fact that handball is played successfully in Spouth America, Asia and Africa, while North America and Oceania are not that strong. The Germans were excluded from the founding of the IHF in 1946 due to the war, the Swede Gusta Björk became the first president, the current incumbent Hassan Moustafa (fifth IHF president) has ruled the association since the turn of the millennium and even if the Egyptian is not undisputed, he managed to become one to develop handball to an economically successful global player.

Field handball is now only practiced as a hobby of some enthusiasts, while indoor handball is ruling, the World Championship not takes several weeks. By the implementation of continental federation, IHF lost some power and money, if you talk about Champions League and European Cup competitions, buth thanks to being an Olympic sport the revenues of IHF are still huge.

Men’s handball is an integral part of the Olympic Games since 1972 and women since 1976, and the eternal struggle to determine which team sport is number two after football will probably continue to be a concern of the IHF for the next 75 years. Possibly the world federation will go through some changes after the age-related end of the Moustafa era. When that will be, however, is still unknown, because the president wants to run again for the next election.