Who invented the squat?
When you do squats for a while, a strange question appears.
When did this movement become “the squat”?
Was it always a gym exercise?
Was the Japanese version shiko from sumo?
Was it simply the old school warm-up movement called knee bends?
The short answer is that the squat was probably not invented once by one person. It is better understood as an ancient human movement that was formalized in different ways by physical culture, combat sports, bodyweight training, and barbell training.
So if we try to name one single origin, the story gets too simple.
The more interesting version is a family tree.
Squat begins with the basic act of crouching
The English word squat first points to something very plain: crouching down.
That basic movement is much older than modern fitness. People crouched to rest, pick things up, work near the ground, sit without chairs, cook, gather, and move through daily life.
Stand.
Lower yourself.
Rise again.
As a movement, that is extremely old.
But ordinary crouching and strength-training squats are not the same thing. A training squat adds purpose: load, repetitions, form, depth, and progression.
The root is daily human movement. The exercise is what happened when that movement became intentional.
In Japan, the closest everyday term is hiza-kusshin
If you look for a Japanese movement close to the modern bodyweight squat, the easiest phrase is hiza-kusshin, or knee bending.
It is the kind of knee-bending motion many people have done in school warm-ups or basic exercise routines.
That makes it close to the squat, but not identical.
- Hiza-kusshin: often a warm-up or mobility movement
- Bodyweight squat: a lower-body strengthening exercise
- Barbell squat: a loaded strength-training movement
The motion overlaps. The purpose changes.
That is a useful pattern for the whole history of squats: similar-looking movements can belong to very different worlds.
Is shiko a squat?
Shiko, the sumo stomping movement, is very close in spirit. But it is not simply “the Japanese squat.”
In shiko, a sumo wrestler raises one leg, balances, opens the hips, and stomps down. It is a foundational sumo movement with training, ritual, and technical meaning.
A modern squat is usually a two-legged movement: lower the hips, bend the knees, stand back up.
Shiko includes other elements:
- single-leg support
- wide hip opening
- a deliberate stomp
- sumo-specific posture and training culture
So the overlap is real. Both train the lower body. Both live near the same human movement family.
But shiko is not just another word for squat. It is better described as a related Japanese sumo training movement built from squatting, stepping, balancing, and stomping.
That distinction matters because it keeps the history cleaner.
Indian baithak: an old bodyweight squat tradition
Another important branch is the Indian baithak, often called the Hindu squat in English.
In Indian wrestling culture, dand and baithak have long been associated with physical conditioning. Dand is often compared to a push-up variation; baithak is the squat-like movement.
This is not the same as a modern gym squat, but it is a major bodyweight tradition: high repetitions, rhythm, conditioning, legs, lungs, and endurance.
The interesting point is that baithak was not mainly a polished fitness class movement. It belonged to a wrestling and physical-culture context.
Before people were thinking about heavy barbell squats in racks, they were already using their own bodyweight to squat again and again.
Deep knee bends came before the modern squat vocabulary
In English-language physical culture, a close predecessor to the modern squat was often called the deep knee bend.
The phrase is almost comically literal: bend the knees deeply.
In late 19th- and early 20th-century physical culture, calisthenics, health exercises, and weight training were developing rapidly. Knee-bending movements were part of that world.
But early deep knee bends were not the same as today’s heavy back squats in a power rack.
Without modern racks, plates, and safety equipment, it was harder to train the high-load barbell squat in the way many lifters do now. The movement developed through bodyweight exercise, lighter implements, different loading styles, and eventually more standardized barbell training.
The barbell squat grew with equipment and sport
Today, many people hear “squat” and picture a barbell across the shoulders.
That version became prominent through the development of barbells, racks, gym culture, strength training, and powerlifting.
In powerlifting, the squat is one of the three competition lifts, alongside the bench press and the deadlift. That gives the squat a formal sporting identity: judged depth, standardized equipment, and the goal of lifting maximum weight.
So the squat has at least two faces:
- an everyday bodyweight movement
- a loaded strength sport movement
They share a name, but they do not always feel like the same exercise.
The origin is not one line. It is a branching tree.
It is tempting to tell the story like this:
“Someone invented the squat, then it spread.”
But the real story is more branched.
- crouching in daily life
- Japanese hiza-kusshin
- sumo shiko and sonkyo
- Indian baithak
- European and American deep knee bends
- barbell squats
- powerlifting
- modern bodyweight fitness
They are similar, but not identical.
That is what makes the squat interesting. It is not just a gym exercise. It is what happens when one of the most basic human movements gets shaped by different cultures and different goals.
You can look at shiko and think of squats.
You can look at knee bends and think of squats.
You can look at baithak and think of squats.
But each one has its own purpose and history.
The squat may be one of the oldest modern exercises
Squat sounds like a modern fitness word.
But the movement underneath it is old.
Crouch.
Stand.
Support the body.
Open the hips.
Return.
That movement has relatives in daily life, sumo, wrestling, physical culture, and strength sport.
So when you do a simple set of squats, you are not just doing a trendy exercise. You are bringing an old human movement back into modern life.
That makes even 10 squats feel a little different.
If you want the practical side, read How Many Squats Should Beginners Do? A Realistic Way to Start.
If you are more interested in making the habit stick, read Why Tracking May Matter More Than Motivation for Sticking With Squats.
References
- Britannica: Squat
- Japan Sumo Association: Basic Sumo Movements
- Japan Sumo Association: Sumo Health Exercises
- Kotobank: Shiko
- Kotobank: Squat
- Squat University: Squat History 101
- Joseph S. Alter: The Wrestler’s Body, University of California Press
- The Art of Manliness: The Hindu Squat
- International Powerlifting Federation: Disciplines
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