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Hello my dear students! Today we're continuing our coverage of the 2012 Summer Games. With the eyes of the world watching, there's a lot of cash on the line for Olympic athletes—the chance of landing huge corporate sponsorships, launching pro careers, even the chance to get money from their own government! While some Olympic athletes compete for money, others play for love... and there's one sport where this is truer than others. Students, can you tell me the name of the sport where athletes play for love?
I hope you guessed tennis! If you've played the game, you know it has a very peculiar scoring system. Scores from zero to three points are described as "love", "fifteen", "thirty", and "forty." Did you ever wonder why? And while we're asking questions, where did the word "tennis" come from anyway? Hot for Word is here to investigate!
The word "tennis" comes from the mid 14th century, most likely from the Anglo-French word "tenetz," which means "Hold! Receive! Take!" Tenetz comes from the Old French word "tenez," which is the imperative (or command) form of tenir, which similarly means "to hold, receive, take." When playing tennis, the server would call out "Tenez" to his opponent... and it seems the word stuck.
But keep in mind that the original game of tennis was quite different than what we play today. Tennis was originally popular with medieval knights, who played by striking the ball with the palm of the hand. Hmmm, if these guys had time for games, perhaps there wasn't as much castle charging and damsel defending as they show in the movies! Anyway, the game was officially called "la paulme" in Old French (which literally meant "the palm"), but the guys hollering "tenez" was much more memorable.
In 1858, a couple gentlemen invented a new version of the sport that was meant to be played on a grass court (this was known as "lawn tennis"). Then, in 1873, a man named Major Walter Wingfield came up with yet another version of Tennis, which he patented under the name "Sphairistike." Even though Wingfield lacked finesse when it came to naming (it's no wonder "Sphairistike" didn't catch on!), his game was popular with British officers, and he helped define the type of court and scoring system that we use today.
So, let's get back to scoring, shall we? Many believe that the use of the word "love" can be traced to the 17th-century expression "play for love," which means "to play without any wager, for nothing." So a score of "love" means zero. And to describe a score when both players have zero, it's proper to say "love-all" -- isn't that lovely?!
Now what about the other numbers? Some believe this comes from Sphairistike, where the scoring system was based on the different gun calibers of the British naval ships. For a salute, the ships first fired their 15-pound guns on the main deck, followed by the 30-pound guns of the middle deck, and then the 40-pound guns on the lower deck... giving us a love-15-30-40 scoring system!
Now, for your homework, I want to hear about the games that you've played for love. Did you ever go bowling, play golf, go skydiving or try some other sport for the sake of your relationship? Or did you just play mind games?! Tell me in the comments!
I hope you guessed tennis! If you've played the game, you know it has a very peculiar scoring system. Scores from zero to three points are described as "love", "fifteen", "thirty", and "forty." Did you ever wonder why? And while we're asking questions, where did the word "tennis" come from anyway? Hot for Word is here to investigate!
The word "tennis" comes from the mid 14th century, most likely from the Anglo-French word "tenetz," which means "Hold! Receive! Take!" Tenetz comes from the Old French word "tenez," which is the imperative (or command) form of tenir, which similarly means "to hold, receive, take." When playing tennis, the server would call out "Tenez" to his opponent... and it seems the word stuck.
But keep in mind that the original game of tennis was quite different than what we play today. Tennis was originally popular with medieval knights, who played by striking the ball with the palm of the hand. Hmmm, if these guys had time for games, perhaps there wasn't as much castle charging and damsel defending as they show in the movies! Anyway, the game was officially called "la paulme" in Old French (which literally meant "the palm"), but the guys hollering "tenez" was much more memorable.
In 1858, a couple gentlemen invented a new version of the sport that was meant to be played on a grass court (this was known as "lawn tennis"). Then, in 1873, a man named Major Walter Wingfield came up with yet another version of Tennis, which he patented under the name "Sphairistike." Even though Wingfield lacked finesse when it came to naming (it's no wonder "Sphairistike" didn't catch on!), his game was popular with British officers, and he helped define the type of court and scoring system that we use today.
So, let's get back to scoring, shall we? Many believe that the use of the word "love" can be traced to the 17th-century expression "play for love," which means "to play without any wager, for nothing." So a score of "love" means zero. And to describe a score when both players have zero, it's proper to say "love-all" -- isn't that lovely?!
Now what about the other numbers? Some believe this comes from Sphairistike, where the scoring system was based on the different gun calibers of the British naval ships. For a salute, the ships first fired their 15-pound guns on the main deck, followed by the 30-pound guns of the middle deck, and then the 40-pound guns on the lower deck... giving us a love-15-30-40 scoring system!
Now, for your homework, I want to hear about the games that you've played for love. Did you ever go bowling, play golf, go skydiving or try some other sport for the sake of your relationship? Or did you just play mind games?! Tell me in the comments!