Sporting Gentleman
TENNIS
The Summer
Game for
Gentlemen
by Henry Gentlemen
This month will see the start of the
Wimbledon Championships, which first were
held in those grounds in 1877. So we thought
we should talk about this most gentlemanly of
sports.
The sport of tennis was first played in its
current incarnation in the late 19th century. It
was called lawn tennis, as the name tennis at
the time was used to refer to the older game
of real tennis. The rules have changed little
since then, with only the addition of the tie
breaker, and the removal of the requirement
for the server to keep one foot on the floor at
all times.
Tennis was originally invented in the French
court of Louis X as a variation of jeu de
paume (game of the palm), and evolved into
real tennis.
Real Tennis
Real Tennis, which is variously called Court
Tennis, Royal Tennis and frequently the
‘sport of Kings’. It came into being in
medieval Europe over the 15th century,
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but had developed over the course of the
previous 3 centuries. In the mid 1500s there
were some 250 courts in Paris alone. It was
amazingly popular in France with a number
of Kings playing it. The first codification of
the rules where written in 1559 but a
frenchman, Fobert. Indeed a Real Tennis
court played a part in the start of the French
Revolution.
It was also extremely popular in England with
Henry V liking it, but it was Henry VIII who
took to it with gusto having a court built in
Hampton Court Palace. This court still exists
and is used to this day. Would you believe
that it has the longest run of consecutive
World Champions, running since 1760? That
is a heck of a history and demands a very
large wall to accommodate all their names!
Real Tennis is a very complex game, where
cunning and skill are more valuable than
strength and fitness. It is played in an indoor
court that has slanted roofs called
‘penthouses’ and long openings called
‘galleries’.