Golf Facts & History

The word "golf" derives from other languages. The Dutch word "kolf" or "kolve" meant "club." It is thought that that word passed on to the Scots, whose own dialect transformed the word into "golve," "gowl" or "gouf." Out of the merging of the two languages and dialects emerged the word "golf".

The form of modern day golf emerged out of Scotland. The earliest known reference to golf comes from King James II of Scotland. In 1457 he actually issued a ban on golf because the archers complained it was keeping them from practicing since the golfers took over the practice field.

The first rules of golf were formed about the 18th Century by the Gentlemen Golfers of Leith who are now known as the Honorable Company of Edinburgh Golfers. They were written for the Annual Edinburgh Silver Club Challenge in 1744.
There were a total of 13 rules. Can you identify the rules that survived into today's modern golf?

1. Ball must be teed within a club's length of the hole.

2. Tee must be on the ground.

3. No change the ball which originally strike off the tee.

4. No removing stones, bones or any break club for the sake of playing your ball, except upon the fair green, and that only within a club's length of the ball.

5. If the ball goes into water, or any watery filth, you may take out the ball and bring it behind the hazard and tee it, it can be played any club but your adversary is given a stroke for getting your ball out.

6. If balls are found touching one another, you are to lift the first ball till you play the last.

7. When playing the hole, you are to play your ball at the hole, and not to play upon your opponents ball, not lying in your way to the hole.

8. If you should lose your ball, by its being taken up, or any other way, you are to go back to the spot where you struck last and drop another ball and allow your adversary a stroke for the misfortune.

9. No person at the hole is to be allowed to mark his way to the hole with his club or anything else.

10. If a ball be stopped by any person, horse, dog, or any thing else, the ball so stopped must be played where it lye's.

11. If you draw your club in order to strike and proceed so far in the stroke as to be bringing down your club, if then your club should break in any way, it is to be accounted a stroke.

12. He whose ball lye's farthest from the hole is obliged to play first.

13. Neither trench, ditch, or dyke made for the preservation of the links, nor the Scholars' Holes or the soldiers' lines shall be accounted a hazard but the ball is to be taken out, teed and play 'd with any iron club.

As golf developed, the rule of the game developed with it over time. In 1897 the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews formed a Rules Committee which helped progress golfing rule to what they are today.

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