Thorsten Reichelt

Seminar paper from the year 2003 in the subject Sport - Miscellaneous, Comenius University in Bratislava, language: English, abstract: The beginning of the sponsoring as it is used today is from the many hundred years ago. The first sponsor were rich people who sponsored poets to write poems for them. So e.g. sponsored Gaius Clinius Maesenas the poets Horaz, Vergil and Properz. With these money these poets could write their important works that are known all over the world.. The beginning of the sponsoring is near the word 'mazenatentum'. A definition of this word is the following: 'Patronage, by both definition and usage, is essentially an altruistic activity carried out with no expectation or return other than the satisfaction of knowing that is being done.' (Diggle 1975, 14). Later in time the rich people also sponsored other people, but the kind of people changed over time. In the beginning poets were sponsored, but in the mid age only scientist and artist were sponsored. In the end of the mid age there was also a new social class created, the bourgeoisie. These people also got rich and gave their money to scientist and artist. In the 19th century there were not only single people sponsoring other people. There were founded art trends and science trends. And so some people didn't sponsor only one but they sponsor a hole group of people with the same goals or same interests. The best example is the will from Alfred Nobel. He said that the best person of one year should have money to go further in his or her main thing. The sponsoring and its meaning like it is used today was found in the end of the last century. The companies started to give money to people who need this money to create something special. At first there was a donation but after a while it was renamed in sponsoring. In those years in the USA many universities were founded due the sponsoring from rich personalities. In Germany the rich personalities sponsored the art and so many art collections were created. Before this time the sponsor did not say that they want to have a return, but from this time on they said it openly. A turning point in the history of the sponsoring was in the 70s of the last century. The cigarette industry were not longer allowed to make commercial in the TV and so they search for a new way to get a commercial effect. The sport was the new thing. And with this thinking of the cigarette industry other industries followed. The sponsoring became more and more important and more and more clubs took advantage of the given chance.