Key takeaways
- Tennis started as a handball game. The racket arrived centuries after the sport did.
- Modern tennis dates from 1873, when a British major published the first rulebook and patented his game.
- Almost everything that defines the sport was decided by a committee of three men in 1877.
- The 15, 30, 40 scoring was not designed. It was inherited from the older indoor game.
- The court they settled on, 78 by 27 feet, is still the court played on today.
Most sports were invented once. Tennis was invented twice, several centuries apart, and the modern version kept a surprising amount of the old one without asking why. The scoring in particular is a fossil.
Here is where the game came from, what was actually decided in 1877, and which parts have not moved since.
Where did tennis come from?
From a French handball game. Britannica traces the origins to a twelfth or thirteenth century game called jeu de paume, meaning game of the palm, which is exactly what it was: a ball struck with the bare hand.
There was no racket and no net as we would recognize one. What there was, already, was the idea of a bounded court, a dividing line and a rally that ends when someone fails to return the ball. That structure is the actual invention, and it is eight hundred years old.
What was real tennis?
The indoor game that grew out of jeu de paume once rackets appeared. It is a complex racket-and-ball sport played in an enclosed court with sloping roofs and walls that are in play, and it is still played today on a small scale.
It goes by different names depending on where you are: real tennis in Britain, court tennis in the United States, royal tennis in Australia. The word real there does not mean genuine as opposed to false. It is closer to royal.
This is the game the modern one borrowed its scoring from, which matters later.
Who invented modern tennis?
Disputed, but there is an official answer. The recognized centennial in 1973 commemorated Major Walter Clopton Wingfield's introduction of the game in 1873. He published the first book of rules that year and took out a patent on it in 1874.
A patent is the telling detail. Wingfield was not codifying a folk game, he was selling a boxed product: a net, rackets, balls and instructions, to be set up on a lawn. Modern tennis entered the world as a commercial kit.
That commercial origin is also why the credit is contested. Wingfield's kit was one of several routes the game took out of the drawing rooms of the 1870s, and the American thread is a separate story covered further down.
Why is it called lawn tennis?
Because it was played on grass by Victorian gentlemen and ladies, and the name stuck. It is still formally lawn tennis in Britain even though the sport long ago moved onto clay, hard courts and synthetic surfaces.
The surface was not a design decision so much as an accident of who owned lawns. Wingfield's market was people with large gardens and croquet sets, and the game was pitched at exactly that room.
What happened in 1877?
Everything that still defines the sport. The All England Croquet Club set aside one of its Wimbledon lawns for tennis, the game proved popular enough that the club renamed itself the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club, and in 1877 it decided to hold a championship.
A subcommittee of three was appointed. Britannica records what they settled:
- A rectangular court, 78 feet long by 27 feet wide.
- The real tennis scoring method: 15, 30, 40, game.
- One fault allowed to the server, meaning two chances at each service.
Britannica's verdict on those three decisions is blunt: they remain part of the modern rules. Twenty-two players entered. Spencer Gore won.
Why is the scoring 15, 30, 40?
Because it was copied, not designed. The 1877 committee took the scoring wholesale from real tennis rather than inventing something for the new game, which is why it makes no arithmetical sense: the steps are 15, 15, then 10.
The usual explanations, a clock face divided into quarters or a medieval betting unit, are folk etymology rather than documented fact, and I would not put either on a wall as though it were settled. What is documented is the borrowing.
So the honest answer to why tennis scores the way it does is that a committee in 1877 had a working system to hand and saw no reason to build a new one.
When did the rules settle down?
Within three years. There were several alterations after 1877, particularly to the height of the net, until 1880, when the All England Club and the MCC published revised rules that closely approximate those still in use.
Three years from first championship to a rulebook that would still be recognizable a century and a half later is remarkably fast. Most sports took far longer to stop arguing.
The modern rulebook is still maintained by the International Tennis Federation, and Rule 1 still specifies that 78 by 27 foot court. The full current text is in the ITF Rules of Tennis, and the measurements are set out in the court dimensions guide.
How did tennis reach the United States?
Through a story that is half wrong, and Britannica says so plainly. Mary Outerbridge of New York has long been credited with bringing a set of rackets and balls back to her brother, a director of the Staten Island Cricket and Baseball Club. But research has shown that William Appleton of Nahant, Massachusetts, may have owned the first lawn tennis set, and that his friends James Dwight and Fred R. Sears were the ones who popularized the game.
Something similar had already happened to the rules. Before the 1877 Wimbledon committee did its work, the Marylebone Cricket Club established a standardized set of tennis rules in 1875, after the ball had changed from rubber to rubber covered with white flannel. The sport arrived in several places at once and was tidied up by several bodies in turn, which is why single-inventor stories about it rarely survive checking.
When did tennis become an international sport?
In 1900, with a trophy bought by a student. The Davis Cup, formally the International Lawn Tennis Challenge Trophy, was donated by the American Dwight F. Davis for a competition between teams from the United States and Great Britain. Davis played on the winning United States teams in the first two meetings, in 1900 and 1902.
The format has been unusually stable. From the start, a Davis Cup round consisted of four singles matches and one doubles match. Belgium and France entered in 1904, and from 1912 the competition came under the supervision of the International Lawn Tennis Federation, which is the point at which tennis stopped being a British and American arrangement and became a world one.
What was the open era?
The moment tennis stopped pretending. Until the late 1960s the major championships were restricted to amateurs, with professionals playing a separate circuit. Opening the majors to both is what began the sport's fastest period of growth.
Television did the rest through the 1970s, along with an expanding professional tour and a run of rivalries that gave broadcasters something to sell. Equipment and clothing changed in the same window, including the end of the all-white rule outside Wimbledon.
It is a useful reminder that the sport's modern shape is about sixty years old, while its court is about a hundred and fifty and its scoring is far older than that.
What has not changed?
| Element | Set in | Still current |
|---|---|---|
| Court 78 by 27 feet (singles) | 1877 | Yes, ITF Rule 1 |
| Scoring 15, 30, 40, game | Inherited from real tennis | Yes |
| One fault, two serves | 1877 | Yes |
| Doubles width 36 feet | Later standardization | Yes |
| Grass as the default surface | 1870s | No, now one of several |
Four of five. For a sport that has changed its rackets, its surfaces, its clothing and its entire professional structure, the playing area and the way points are counted have proved almost immovable.
Why does tennis imagery work on a wall?
Because the sport is unusually graphic. A court from above is nested rectangles with one line of symmetry. A ball against clay is two flat colors. The equipment is simple enough to read instantly, which is why tennis subjects hang well in rooms that have nothing to do with sport.
- Court plans are wide. Give them a run of wall above a console or sideboard.
- Clay, grass and hard courts give three completely different palettes. Match the room, not the surface you play on.
- Vintage equipment reads warmer than action photography and suits a study better.
- Keep one line-heavy piece per wall. Two diagrams compete and neither is read.
The range sits in the tennis wall art collection, with placement covered in choosing tennis wall art and vintage racket decor.
Featured tennis pieces
Frequently asked questions
Who invented tennis?
Major Walter Clopton Wingfield is officially credited. He published the first book of rules in 1873 and patented his game in 1874, and the sport's recognized centennial in 1973 commemorated that date.
What was tennis before rackets?
A French handball game called jeu de paume, or game of the palm, dating from the twelfth or thirteenth century. The ball was struck with the bare hand; rackets came later and produced real tennis.
Why is tennis scored 15, 30, 40?
Because the 1877 Wimbledon committee adopted the scoring method of real tennis rather than devising a new one. The popular clock-face and betting explanations are folk etymology, not documented fact.
When was the first Wimbledon?
1877. Twenty-two players entered and Spencer Gore won. The same championship set the court at 78 by 27 feet and allowed the server one fault, both still in the rules.
Why is tennis called lawn tennis?
Because it was first played on grass by Victorian gentlemen and ladies. It is still formally lawn tennis in Britain, although the sport is now played on clay, hard and synthetic surfaces too.
