| Event: | Men's bantamweight freestyle wrestling |
| Games: | 1908 Summer |
| Venue: | White City Stadium |
| Date: | July 20 |
| Competitors: | 13 |
| Nations: | 3 |
| Gold: | George Mehnert |
| Goldnoc: | USA |
| Silver: | William Press |
| Silvernoc: | GBR |
| Bronze: | Aubert Côté |
| Bronzenoc: | CAN |
| Prev: | 1904 |
| Next: | 1924 |
The freestyle bantamweight was one of five freestyle wrestling weight classes contested on the Wrestling at the 1908 Summer Olympics programme. Like all other wrestling events, it was open only to men. The bantamweight was the lightest class, allowing wrestlers of up to 54 kilograms (119 lb).[1] Each nation could enter up to 12 wrestlers.[2]
11 British athletes, 1 American, and 1 Canadian participated.
The event was a single-elimination tournament with a bronze medal match between the semifinal losers. The final and bronze medal match were best two-of-three, while all other rounds were a single bout. Bouts were 15 minutes, unless one wrestler lost by fall (two shoulders on the ground at the same time). Other than falls, decisions were made by the judges or, if they did not agree, the referee.
Wrestlers could "take hold how and where they please[d]" except that "hair, flesh, ears, private parts, or clothes may not be seized"; striking, scratching, twisting fingers, butting, and kicking were prohibited. Holds "obtained that the fear of breakage or dislocation of a limb shall induce a wrestler to give the fall" were outlawed, and particularly the double-nelson, hammerlock, strangle, half-strangle, scissors, hang, flying mare with palm uppermost, and the foot twist.[3]