Love, Etymologically Trivia Quiz

Answer: Skiing

Skiing is a prehistoric invention, dating back to ancient Nordic people who strapped wood to their feet in order to assist in hunting and in war. Carvings from around 5000 BCE indicate that skiing has been in place as a practical, rather than leisure, activity for millennia. Icelandic sagas use the word; there is even a Norse god and goddess for skiing. Norwegian Sondre Norheim, "The Father of Modern Skiing", created the templates from which modern skis are made around 1850. New innovations, like the development of competition skiing, helped the sport become popular around the world by the start of the twentieth century.

Answer: Soccer

"Soccer" comes from a shortening of the already abbreviated "Assoc.", which stood for "association football", the name by which soccer is called in a majority of English-speaking countries around the world (some exceptions are the United States, Canada, and Australia). Obviously, taking the first three letters of "Assoc." would be problematic, so 19th-century college students (most notably Charles Wreford-Brown) changed the word first to "socca", then "socker", then finally "soccer". Cambridge University published the first rules for proper play of the game in 1848; the first FA cup occurred in 1872; and the first World Cup was played in Uruguay in 1930.

Answer: Lacrosse

Lacrosse has its origins in a stick-and-ball game played by the Huron and Iroquois Native American tribes in what is today northern United States and Canada. De Brebeuf probably named the game for posterity when he called it "la jeu de la crosse" (literally "game of the hooked sticks"), which was shortened into "lacrosse".

In 1856, the first organized lacrosse club was founded in Montreal. By the twentieth century, it was popular in many North American communities as a team sport somewhat similar to American football. Lacrosse is divided into two varieties: field, which is somewhat more common, and box, which is played indoors on artificial turf.

Answer: Cricket

Cricket used as a sport term is newer etymologically than its reference to an insect; however, both word forms might derive from the French word "criquet". Many European scholars believe, though, that the sport's name is from a Dutch source. Starting as a children's game in the early 17th century, it became more popular with adults as time went on, and an English professional team was formed by the 1670s.

By the 1700s, new ideas, such as the use of a single wicket for smaller games and the concept of "bowling," evolved.

The game was exported to British territorial possessions in the 1800s. Although it failed to catch on in many countries, it had become immensely popular in the UK and Australia by the end of the 20th century.

Answer: Boxing

Boxing is one of the earliest sports known to man. Pictures of punching duels appear in Sumerian engravings from 3000 BCE; in 1927, a tablet depicting two fighters getting ready to box was found and is estimated to be 7000 years old. The use of boxing gloves has its origins in Minoan civilization more than 1000 years before the common era. Common in the Greek and Roman Empires, boxing in the modern era began in 1743 with the establishment of the Broughton Rules, which were essentially enforced to stop fighters from killing each other in the ring.

The Marquis of Queensberry established his own set of rules in 1867. They continued with very little variation to the present.

Answer: Surfing

The word "surf" is quite old, considering the newness of the hobby: its first recorded mention in 1685 was probably a derivation of the word "suffe". The origin of both of these words is uncertain, however. Surfing itself has a murky past: first recorded by Europeans traveling near Tahiti in 1767, it almost certainly made up a large part of Polynesian culture before European influence. Ancient Hawaiians considered surfing more of an art form than a leisure activity or competition; they called for a "kahuna", or priest, to pray for higher waves and better surf when the ocean was flat.

In 1907, surfing was brought to North America; in 1915, it was introduced to Australia. Eighty years later, the word was used to mean navigation around the new World Wide Web.

Answer: Hockey

Hockey was first mentioned in the 16th century, but it's unlikely that it was commonly played back then; modern hockey is thought to have developed in Canada from a number of sources, including native games and European introductions like shinty and hurling.

The first recorded game of hockey occurred in the 1850s between British officers stationed in Ontario and Nova Scotia. The word "puck" is thought to be derived from a Scottish/Gaelic word for poke or punch. Originally it was used not to refer to the cylindrical object that the players used; instead, it defined the actual push that a player exerted upon the ball with which they played.

Answer: Rugby

The sport of rugby was named after the Rugby School, where it was founded sometime between 1823 and 1848. Probably most significant in rugby's history was its split in 1895 into two distinct sports: Rugby Union and Rugby League. Rugby League was made into a professional sport with simpler rules; today it is mostly popular in Australia and parts of England. Rugby Union kept the original rules and stayed amateur until 1995.

The latter is generally more popular and more widely-followed.

Answer: Golf

Golf is traditionally associated with Scotland for good reason: the game is often cited to have its origins in Scottish shepherds hitting stones into rabbit holes near the current site of the St. Andrews golf club. The actual origins of the game are up for debate: some say that the Roman paganica or Chinese chuiwan bear an uncanny resemblance to the modern game.

Other suspects for golf's origins include the French chambot (or pall mall), the Persian chaugan, or the Dutch kolven. Regardless of its history, the supposed etymology of golf as an acronym for "Gentlemen Only, Ladies Forbidden" is almost certainly not true.

Answer: Tennis

Tennis is thought to have its origins in the French word "tenez", a variant of the verb "tenir", which means to hold or take. The archaic version of the game was especially popular with French knights, but the more modern version with a net, racquets, and balls, wasn't formally invented until the 19th century. It was referred to as "lawn tennis" in early years and was a staple of royal society's entertainment; since then, it has expanded to appeal to many regions, classes, and age ranges.

It's commonly said that the word "love" originates from the French word for "l'oeuf", meaning egg (implying goose egg, or zero points scored). In fact, like seemingly all etymologies, there are a number of other origins for the term, which could also derive from the French "l'heure" (or hour) or from a Dutch phrase "iets voor lof den", meaning "to do something for praise" (and therefore, for no points). It appears that love, etymologically, is still a mystery!