Ping Pong - Not Chinese

Image via WikipediaI was surprised to learn yesterday that ping pong has its origins in the Victorian drawing room with bored toffs hitting champagne corks over a row of books with the lid of a cigar box as a bat.

The game has its origins in England as an after-dinner amusement for upper-class Victorians in the 1880s. Mimicking the game of tennis in an indoor environment, everyday objects were originally enlisted to act as the equipment. A line of books would be the net, a rounded top of a champagne cork or knot of string as the ball, and a cigar box lid as the racket^[2].

Table tennis evolved into the modern game in Europe, the United States and Japan.^[3] The popularity of the game led game manufacturers to sell the equipment commercially. Early rackets were often pieces of parchment stretched upon a frame, and the sound generated in play gave the game its first nicknames of "whiff-whaff" and "Ping-pong."

I always assumed that it was from Peking, such is its popularity. All we are missing now are the top hats and the smoking jackets.