Who invented croquet?

Answer 1

As with many of the best things in life croquet seems to have started with the Romans. They used to use a stick to strike a number of trees within a designated area. The game was called Paganica and was used as a way to teach hunting skills. As time passed the game moved into more enclosed areas and branched off to form games such as Golf where the trees were replaced with holes and the other used hoops or wickets and was became known as Palle-Maille.

Palle-Maille seems to have become most popular in towns and villages where space was harder to come by. We believe that the sport know as Croquet came from France and seems to come from the peasant's version of the game where a shepherd crook (Croc) was used in place of a stick more traditionally used. The Croc later became the mallets we are now familiar with in the modern game.

Palle-Maille was popular throughout France and was later introduced into Ireland in the 1800's. Records then show that the game was being played regularly after 1852 in Ireland and seems to have moved into England shortly after this.

The game of Palle-Maille moved into England in the early part of the 19th century and was publicized and promoted in its modern form of Croquet.

In 1868 The All England Croquet Club was formed.

The game itself has changed little of the years and Croquet Setsremain pretty standard in their equipment. In recent years we have seen new versions of the game such as Croqkick, a football version of the traditional game and new Family croquets sets which have appeared over the last few years.

Croquet pits each player against the others and there are no team versions of the sport.

The game is a simple matter of pushing your ball through the hoops in the correct order then on to the winning post quicker than you opponents. There are now many different versions of the game and tactics and strategies make this a challenging and competitive sport.