Forum: Author Hangout

Another possible derivation of for the name football, the ball is oblong, not round and is just under a foot long (11 to 11.25 inches).

That is clearly coming out from the backside. For example, just look at the kanji word they use in CJK translations: 足球 or 蹴球. It is (foot (lower limb) (Chinese) or kick (Japanese and Korean)) + ball, not (foot (length) + ball) which would be something like 尺球.

NFL at least has the courtesy to use the term "橄榄球" ("olive" + ball") a catch-all term for oblong-shaped ball which has nothing about length etc. in their nflchina website, acknowledging it has nothing to do with foot or football.

It was regularly called soccer in the UK until the last couple of decades of the 20th century.

The link I posted above has an entomology for "soccer".

But it was the English who took football to heart. In 1863 they devised "The Laws of the Game" by "The Football Association," commonly called Association Football. Young boys who would inquire if they wanted to play football or "association", would shortened the name down to "assoccer" and then later just "soccer."

It was regularly called soccer in the UK until the last couple of decades of the 20th century.

From someone who grew up in said UK for the 2nd half of the twentieth century I would have to use the famous American phrase ... BULLSHIT. For my first 10 years in Scotland, it was fitba'. In England it was football or footie. I can even remember as a young teenager asking my Dad, "What is soccer?"

I agree it was "footie". "Soccer" never made it to the masses in the UK (although it is probably the language of the aristocracy that counted and they don't watch footie).

Polo is the game for the aristos. Simulated whacking the head of a pleb with a war club.
Golf is the game for the middle class. Simulated whacking the head of a pleb, but they can't afford the horses.
Football is the game for the plebs. Simulated kicking the head of an aristo pulled from his horse by a mob.
Rugby is the game for the military caste. Physical clash of two platoons with the captain making the strategy.
Cricket is the game of the imperial administrator. Its training for standing in the tropical sun being polite, with short bursts of action required every now and then.

Golf is the game for the middle class. Simulated whacking the head of a pleb, but they can't afford the horses.

I don't think golf was affordable for the mutton-eaters (the origin of the middle class) until much later. More likely it was hockey (on grass that is). Same description though XD.

Golf is flog backwards.

Allegedly it would be a third of the price of lamb, if available.

That I'm not so sure. Yes if you get the sheep at no cost from the farm and only add the transportation cost etc, but we all know somewhere in that supply chain they will jack up the price to close to the price of lamb just because they can :(

I guess "soccer" is never used in the UK.

World Soccer is an English-language football magazine, published by Kelsey Media. The magazine was established in 1960 and is the oldest continually published football magazine in the United Kingdom.[2][3] It specialises in the international football scene. Its regular contributing writers include Brian Glanville, Keir Radnedge, Sid Lowe and Tim Vickery. World Soccer is a member of the European Sports Magazines (ESM), an umbrella group of similar magazines printed in other languages. The members of this group elect a European "Team of the Month" and a European "Team of the Year".

from Wikipedia.
Or look up Goal magazine covers from the 1960s and 70s. A UK magazine with the tag line "The World's Greatest Soccer Weekly"
I don't doubt that football was the more popular term in the UK, but Soccer was always known and used.

The English newspapers on the British Newspaper Archive have 629K hits for soccer in the 1990s. There are double that number for the entire archive, but that includes Irish papers that normally use soccer for the game.

Didn't look for a couple of reasons.
I would expect that football is the much, much more common name and it would be impossible to distinguish from other uses of football.
As I said before, I don't doubt that football is the vastly more common term in the UK. But it is no more the "correct" term than the one used by the majority of native English speakers.

All words are "correct" or not based upon usage. And there can be more than one correct word for the same thing.
Soccer is the correct word for most native English speakers. Football is the correct word for a minority of English speakers and for many (most?), but not all speakers of other languages.

For Americans who allegedly call it soccer, what do they say when it comes to the governing organisations and the rules?

The US national organizations mostly use the term soccer. The use of "football" for soccer in the US is mostly just when referring to the international organizations.

Even the US teams that compete in the Olympics and world cup under the auspices of the international organizations use soccer rather than football in their team names.

https://www.ussoccer.com/

The teams don't use "football club" in their marketing. I live in an area with 3 MLS teams. I would bet that if you asked 100 random people on the street for the name of any of them you wouldn't get more than a handful of people who could name one.

They would be more likely to be able to name Arsenal, Manchester United or Real Madrid than any MLS team other than the LA Galaxy.

Where do you get the idea that many Americans call it football? They simply don't. It's called soccer from the youngest kids to the senior national men's and women's teams.
And the US is not the only English speaking country that uses the name soccer. For that matter, in Japan it's called sakka.

Kids who go to school here plau on soccer teams. People who play in college play on soccer teams. People who play on international teams play on soccer teams. Why would they call 8t football?

Whatever, recent immigrants may do in secret is something I can't guess, but when speaking to other Americans they call it soccer. I live in an area full of recent arrivals from Europe and Asia and have never heard them say football when discussing that game.

What I really can't understand is the British obsession with this. Do you think Americans care what you call it?

It's like the color vs. colour issue. Brit are obsessed by the misconception that Americans "changed" the language by using the "wrong" spelling.
Also you left out Canada, NZ and SA as "football" countries.

Sorry, that makes no sense.

Do you seriously think that they are branded that way?

Hell, the Mets are really the New York Metropolitan Baseball Club, Inc.

Except in a joking reference to the "Metropolitans" they are never referenced that way.
And why is there a need to switch names? The US National Women's Soccer team has done pretty well using the correct (for Americans) name.

What I really can't understand is the British obsession with this. Do you think Americans care what you call it?

Lots of us here in the UK have an obsession with (Association) football, which we know others refer to as soccer (to distinguish it from what is known as football in whatever part of this small and interconnected world they live). And of course when we Brits are in another country, we will fit in with local norms and refer to the sport as soccer. But whether or not we play, follow or ignore the sport, it would be rare to use the term 'soccer' in common parlance when at home in the UK (except to make a point).

Is it being obsessive to say this in this forum? I think not. Pedantic maybe - but that is a trait that many (most?) posters in this site have in common. If an author posted a story set in the UK and had a character talking about going out to watch a soccer match, I'd assume they were non-native (or a returned ex-pat).

(Edited to correct punctuation, and add:) Surely it's not inappropriate to point this out?

If an author posted a story set in the UK and had a character talking about going out to watch a soccer match, I'd assume they were non-native (or a returned ex-pat).

I agree, if the story was set in current times, but that's not the issue here.
The issue is that we are somehow ignorant calling it soccer, rather than football.
Brits claim the same type of false superiority over the American supposed corruption of the language: things like -or vs. -our endings, or "check" vs. "cheque."
It's just another example of the pervasive anti-American bias found throughout the UK.

It's just another example of the pervasive anti-American bias found throughout the UK.

You would absolutely hate being French. (Or course they deserve it)

What you describe as "pervasive antiAmerican bias". Is actually something completely different. Your founding fathers fled Europe and subsequently gained independence. We understand that America is a very young country and is still learning how to behave. Obviously many of us judge your progress by your actions.

(And your ability to spell)

:)

You would absolutely hate being French. (Or course they deserve it)

The irony is that your adoration of the French is what led to your abandonment of the older spellings like "color" or "check" in favor of French-like spellings.

I assume you're excluding Scotland, Wales and N.I. from your definition of the UK.
Interestingly, in many respects American English has a closer resemblence to "original" English than British English.

Interestingly, in many respects American English has a closer resemblence to "original" English than British English.

Bovine excrement.

The corruption of British English by Samuel Johnson's French imitations never caught on in the US.
Ending "-ize" words as "-ise" or "-or" words with "-our", all attributable to Johnson's innovations,

Why is it called American Rugby and not just Rugby?

That was an attempt at humour based on the LA organizers trying to add American Football and American Baseball.

So they were just trying to be contrary.

There were large numbers of stick and ball games from time immemorial all over the world. The same with pick up the ball (an inflated bladder) and run or kick the ball games.

The formal rules of baseball were developed in the mid-1800s as universal education and general literacy spread. Same with real (American and Canadian) football, soccer, rugby, Gaelic football, Aussie Rules football and probably dozens of other games from dozens of sources.

Baseball and softball should be Olympic sports. Football would be impossible to add simply based on time. You might be able to have a 4 team tournament, but likely nothing more and qualifying tournaments would be financially impossible.
ETA: Looking at this, it's flag football that is the proposed sport. That wouldn't have the same time restrictions as regular football.

Baseball and softball are very popular sports throughout Latin America, Asia and the Pacific. I don't think any other similar games have anywhere near the same interest, except possibly cricket due to Pakistan and India. That's also under consideration for inclusion.
As to fan interest: there are plenty of events in the Olympics that have very little attraction for viewers.

@Mushroom

It has actually been played in the Olympics many times.

Flag football? Really?

Pretty sure Mushroom was referring to baseball.

It's a very popular sport in the US and over 20MM play it around the world. So, why not?

It'll probably scrape into LA but I can't see it becoming a permanent fixture.

It has actually been played in the Olympics many times.

I think AJ was referring to Flag Football with the comment about it scraping into LA but not becoming a permanent fixture.

Baseball and softball should be Olympic sports. Football would be impossible to add simply based on time.

I'd put a plea in for cricket which is played and followed by vastly more people world-wide than baseball (thanks India). Also, if I recall correctly, Rugby Sevens - the cut down 7-a-side version of rugby was played as a men's and as a woman's competition at the Sydney Olympics.

Cricket in the Olympics? Seems reasonable to me, but that doesn't mean baseball and softball should be excluded.

Heavens forfend!

Baseball and softball should be Olympic sports.

Baseball at the Summer Olympics unofficially debuted at the 1904 Summer Olympics in St. Louis, and was first contested as a demonstration sport at the 1912 Summer Olympics in Stockholm. It became an official Olympic sport at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, then was played at each Olympiad through the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. The sport was then dropped from the Summer Olympic program, until being revived for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo for a single appearance. It is next expected to be part of the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

Softball at the Summer Olympics was on the Olympic program from 1996 to 2008. It was introduced at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. Softball was removed from the program for 2012 and 2016, but was added for a one-off appearance, along with baseball, for the 2020 Summer Olympics

Baseball

Baseball was invented the first time a ball was balanced on top of another.

The "baseball" is the lowest ball in the stack, column, tower etc of balls.

Note that if only American teams are competing, it is called the "World Series", presumably to ensure that an American team wins.

Toronto Blue Jays

Who participate only as members of "the American League".

Cricketand Baseball both descended from Rounders

Rounders is descended from whacking your neighbor about the head with your club (bat) and stealing his wife. From all I hear about 21st century LA, that may be appropriate for the games.

Cricketand Baseball both descended from Rounders, Bass-Ball, Stoolball and other games before it.

I don't know about cricket, but baseball isn't decended from Rounders. Even the name "Rounders" came long after another game called base-ball or baseball.
I do agree with the rest of your post.

Where? I've read that article and there is nothing that claims "Rounders was first mentioned around the Tudor era."

There is an unreferenced claim:

The game of rounders has been played in England since Tudor times,[2] with the earliest reference[2][10] being in 1744 in A Little Pretty Pocket-Book where it was called base-ball.[11] In 1828, William Clarke in London published the second edition of The Boy's Own Book, which included the rules of rounders and also the first printed description in English of a bat and ball base-running game played on a diamond.[12] The following year, the book was published in Boston, Massachusetts.

[13]

There is no support for that claim or Tudor era "rounders."

Baseball and Rounders both came from earlier stick and ball games, but there is no evidence that one arose from the other.

Baseball and Rounders both came from earlier stick and ball games,

Could you please post links to the source(s) of your claim?

https://ima.princeton.edu/2021/04/01/baseballs-medieval-origins-confirmed/
https://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Origins_of_baseball

Thank you for posting the links.

The first article seems very similar to one written by a different researcher at another university, it also includes the image except it lacks the flowery interpretation.
It is possibly note worthy to add that the complete image which both sources have cropped includes a naked man pushing a wheelbarrow containing four nuns towards a building. Presumably that would be the rounders team bus on tour?
Also the Monastery was formed with both monks and nuns who all took vows of chastity, poverty and silence. The included image purported to show a game of rounders could just as easily be a nun who broke her vow of silence holding a ball gag whilst the monk is about to apply the paddle he is holding as punishment.

As for the solder's observation of Washington and his ADC throwing and catching a ball to each other...
Playing catch isn't of itself anything more than playing catch. It is basically impossible to say which game they are practising for, if any. It could be rounders, but it could equally be beach volleyball, basketball, cricket, handball, netball... etc etc etc.

All that these articles prove is that the exact origins are unknown and various people have widely varying opinions. There are a few early references to games involving a bat and ball, but serious documentation does not really start until the 1800's when commonly accepted rules are drafted to apply to all those teams playing each other.

Out of interest Ngram shows the word cricket in use from 1550 but rounders only from 1608. Which is of course conclusive proof of nothing.

As regards the French origin, the French have long resisted the addition of new words whilst bemoaning the use of anglo words. For this reason the french word for hamburger is 'le hamburger', cricket in french is cricket, and rounders is rounders.
Whilst games involving a bat and ball were played long ago in England and France, neither rounders or cricket originated in France. If it had so long ago then there would be a french word for it. They would not use the English word.

The point being that whilst rejecting offered sources, your rebuttal is based on sources that themselves qualify themselves with words such as 'hypothesis'.
Not exactly a statement of concrete fact accompanied by proof.

What country other than France could have devised a pseudo war game that involves throwing away your weapon and running?

Fair point, but to be believable, having surrendered the batsman would then collaborate with the other team.

Thus would they be hung by their own Pétain.

You miss my point.
The claim was that baseball was derived from Rounders. There is zero evidence to support that idea.
It appears likely that both developed at about the same time, but separately, from the same origins.
As to the ngram, the wors "rounders" was not just a reference to the game.

As to the ngram, the wors "rounders" was not just a reference to the game.

Which is exactly why I noted that the Ngram is conclusive proof of nothing.

Could you please post links to the source(s) of your claim?

[I feel there should be a cool Latin phrase for It is obvious but all I can find is perspicuum est.]

The statement is so obviously correct that I don't see why you need a source. It's like someone saying, the sun rises in the east. And you asking, "Source?"

It's like someone saying, the sun rises in the east. And you asking, "Source?"

Actually, the sun does not rise in the east. Earth's orbit is such that the sun becomes visible from an easterly direction…

For the sun to "rise" in the east it would have to be orbiting Earth.

Finally the sun is actually below the horizon at sunrise (and sunset). It is visible only due to refraction.

As one pedant to another, I love your style. ;-)

For the sun to "rise" in the east it would have to be orbiting Earth.

Depending on where you are in space looking at the earth and pick one spot on the earth you will see it either turns clockwise or Conter-clockwise or ascending or descending.

Early American football had more in common with Gaelic Football than rugby.

Early American football

How early?

How can you call it a sport if there is no frisbee involved?

What kind of sport involves frozen bees?

What kind of sport involves frozen bees?

Ice Honey?
Swarm Cycle in the Velodrome? (Chosen Frozen Memorial Race)

Mary, Mary quite contrary

"Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary
Traditional nursery rhymes
The earliest version of "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" first known as "Mistress Mary, Quite contrary" was recorded in the "Pretty Song Book" a collection of nursery rhymes published by Tommy Thumb, dating back to about 1744.

The origins of "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" are uncertain. The character of Mary has been most often related to Bloody Mary or Mary Tudor, first daughter of Henry VIII who later became England' Queen Mary I.

This is a reliable theory as "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" nursery rhyme originated in England.

Other sources claim that the song is about Mary Queen of Scots. There are also some other religious associations regarding the silver bells in the song representing the Catholic "sanctus bells" or "altar bells".

"Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" Lyrics
Modern Version:
Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And pretty maids all in a row.

"Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" Original Version:
Mistress Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With Silver Bells, And Cockle Shells,
And so my garden grows."
Based on these lyrics perhaps gardeners are to blame, since they are the ones who make gardens grow.