Jeu de paume facts for kids
Jeu de paume is an old ball game from France. It was played indoors on a court. Think of it as an early version of tennis, but people first used their hands instead of racquets. Later, racquets were invented for the game. This sport was even an Olympic sport once! It also has the oldest world championship that is still happening today, started over 250 years ago. Today, it's often called "real tennis" or "court tennis" in the US. In France, it's sometimes called courte paume.
History of Jeu de Paume
In the very first games, players hit the ball with their bare hands. This was similar to games like volleyball or pelota. The name Jeu de paume actually means "palm game" in French. Over time, players started wearing gloves to protect their hands.
Later, around the late 1600s, people began using paddle-like bats. Soon after, racquets became the main equipment for the game. Even with these changes, the name of the game stayed the same for a while. In English, it became known simply as "tennis."
When a new game called "lawn tennis" became very popular, the original Jeu de paume was given a new name: "real tennis." This helped people tell the two games apart.
In France today, Jeu de paume can mean the old indoor game or even modern tennis. The indoor version is sometimes called courte paume ("short palm"). This helps tell it apart from longue paume ("long palm"), which is an outdoor game played on a long field.
Jeu de paume was a medal event at the 1908 Summer Olympics. An American player named Jay Gould II won the gold medal.
Since 1740, there has been an amateur world championship for Jeu de paume. It happens every year in September. This makes it the oldest active trophy in international sports!
Sports That Came From Jeu de Paume
Many popular sports today developed from Jeu de paume. Here are some of them:
- American handball
- Basque pelota
- Fistball
- Frisian handball
- Gaelic handball
- Longue paume
- Pallone
- Valencian pilota
- Volleyball
- Court tennis
- Tennis
Images for kids
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Jeu de paume in the 17th century.
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Earliest known picture of Jeu de Paume from a Book of Hours (around 1300).
See also
In Spanish: Juego de palma para niños
