Wimbledon viewers are only just realising why the sport is called tennis.

​​This year’s Wimbledon is in full swing, with the competition’s latest drama taking place off the court as seven time champion Novak Djokovic blasted fans who “chose to disrespect” him by booing during his match against Holger Rune.

And amid the sport’s most iconic grand slam, viewers are only just discovering the etymology of the word ‘tennis’.

The sport is said to have originated from an elaborate handball game played by medieval French knights. The game, called ‘La Paulme’ (French for ‘The Palm’), saw players strike the ball with the palm of their hand in an enclosed space.

As per the Online Etymology Dictionary, the name tennis, is most likely to come from the Anglo-French tenetz, which translates to “hold! receive! Take!”. This was used as a call from the server to his opponent.

It is a contested claim however, with Century Dictionary insisting that all of this is “purely imaginary.”

The use of the word in the modern game is from 1874, as short for ‘lawn tennis’.

Lawn tennis was originally named sphairistike, which comes from the Greek word ‘sphairistikē’ – (skill in playing at ball).

Wimbledon is taking place across the next two weeks (Getty)

Lawn tennis was said to have been invented and named by Major Walter C. Wingfield and played first at a garden party in Wales, inspired by the popularity of badminton.

While historians have concluded that similar games were played earlier and that a tennis club had been established in 1872 by Harry Gem and several associates, Wingfield published the first book of rules and took out a patent on his game in 1874.

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