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Sporting history in the collections we care for
- Expert curated
Taking part in sports is a popular pastime all over the world. Learn about the art and collections we look after with connections to sport throughout history, from the origins of the Olympics to the codification of croquet.
Sporting culture in our collections
Whether played for fun, to put physical skills to the test or to entertain a crowd, sport has a long history in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
From the equipment and spaces used for different games to accounts and artistic representations of sporting activities, objects and places in our care are a rich resource for learning about the popularity and evolution of various sports through the centuries, many of which are still played today.
Early sports
The Ancient Greeks are credited with the introduction of organised sport, holding the first Olympic Games in 776 BCE. This event included sports like running and hockey, and quickly grew to include boxing, javelin and discus. In its earliest days, sport was closely connected with warfare, and sporting competitions demonstrated individual strength and physical prowess.
Athletics
This marble sculpture at Petworth House in West Sussex is a Roman copy after a bronze original attributed to Polykleitos. The athlete is shown raising his right hand and holding a flask, or aryballos, from which he pours oil into his other hand. During training and competition, Greek athletes were typically naked and they applied oil to their bodies before exercise.
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Cricket
The earliest known ‘creckett’ reference dates to 1598. Growing in popularity, the game spread internationally in the 19th century as a consequence of the British Empire, and remains popular around the world today.
Knole, Kent
John Frederick Sackville, 3rd Duke of Dorset (1745–99), was a keen cricketer and hosted games at Knole, his home in Kent. He also called for women to be allowed to play, writing: ‘What is human life but a game of cricket and, if so, why should not the ladies play it as well as we.’
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Tennis
Modern lawn tennis evolved in the late 19th century, and had deep roots in the medieval game, ‘real tennis’, which was favoured by many royals, especially the Tudors. Allegedly, Henry VIII was playing real tennis on his personal court at Hampton Court when his second wife Anne Boleyn was arrested.
Little Moreton Hall, Cheshire
This is one of the Tudor-era tennis balls found in the Long Gallery at Little Moreton Hall in Cheshire during its restoration. The balls are made of leather stitched together and thought to be stuffed with moss.
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Croquet
One of the places in our care has a special role in the story of croquet. The rules were codified at Chastleton House and Gardens, Oxfordshire, by Walter Whitmore Jones in 1866. Jones was born and lived at Chastleton, and had a passion for inventing games. Croquet is thought to have been imported from France around this time, derived from the French game ‘paille-maille’, where players used wooden mallets to hit balls.
Dorneywood, Buckinghamshire
Croquet is shown as part of an allegorical panel by Rex Whistler at Dorneywood, Buckinghamshire. He painted it for Sir Courtauld-Thomson to separate the front door and the hall of his house. Although the garden pictured in the larger panel is imagined, the walled croquet lawn shown is real and still in use.
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Swimming and diving
Swimming, whether in a pool, lake or river, remains a popular way to exercise, cool off on a warm day, or compete – as captured in this account from Beningbrough.
Beningbrough, Yorkshire
During the 1890s and 1900s, the Dawnays who lived at Beningbrough were a sporty family. The most accomplished of them was Vere, the youngest daughter, who was a champion golfer and swimmer. Her son later wrote, ‘she was a medal-winning high diver and family legend had it that Queen Victoria came to the Bath Club where a special platform had been built for her, and sank forwards, murmuring ‘My God! My God!’ as mama executed her swallow dive backwards.’
Billiards
A book of 1674, called The Compleat Gamester, described billiards as ‘much approved of and played by most nations of Europe, especially in England, there being few towns of note therein which hath not a public billiard table…’. We don’t know much about the people who made these tables, but it was a very specialised craft, with a huge amount of skill involved in getting the bed as flat as possible so that balls would run smoothly.
Knole, Kent
Very few early billiard tables survive, making this late 17th-century mahogany-framed table at Knole very rare. Early billiard cues, like those shown resting on the table, were slightly curved at the tip.
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Horse racing
The 15th and 16th centuries saw a rise in the popularity of equestrian sports. Racehorses were the sports cars of their day and proud owners commissioned artists to paint them. Racehorses feature in many of the 11,000 paintings in our care.
Mount Stewart, County Down
One of the most famous paintings in our collection is Hambletonian, Rubbing Down by George Stubbs (1724–1806), a 12ft-wide painting at Mount Stewart, County Down. Hambletonian, a racehorse owned by Sir Henry Vane-Tempest, had won a thrilling victory at Newmarket in 1799.
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