

The royal passion for playing golf in the beauties of Scotland and the increased interest in the country contributed to the widespread obsession with Scottish history and traditions. For example, the first female player in such an ancient sport was the Queen of Scotland, Mary Stuart (Whigham et al., 2021). There are many well-established traditions and legends associated with golf. Golf is not just a sports discipline but also an extensive culture. Over time, the club was renamed the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers. In this golf club, a regulated set of rules appeared for the first time, which was announced by Duncan Forbes. Competitions were held among the players every year, where the main prize was a silver stick.
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The first golf club was called The Gentlemen Golfers of Leith and opened in 1744 (Zhang & Wu, 2018). The passion for the game spread first to England and then around the world. At the end of the nineteenth century, international popularity came to golf. The most longstanding golfing championship venue was OldLinks at Musselburgh Racecourse ( Musselburgh Links, n.d.). These activities were not in vain because soon tournaments began to be held between Scottish cities, where the masters gave all their strength to win. When golf appeared in Scotland, residents were often so fond of the game that they forgot about their duties, giving all of their time to the new engaging activity. Moreover, golf has opened a new direction in the sport, forcing many people to give themselves to their favorite business.

Someone was playing for fun for some people, it meant much more than just fun. At the same time, the so-called golf clubs began to emerge, in which players could hone their skills. (2021) write that “the claims for the Scottish origins of golf has been seriously questioned and have been undermined by evidence suggesting that the sport may have been introduced to Scotland from elsewhere in Europe” (p. It is believed that golf was invented in the small town of Saint Andrews (Butler, 2019). There is no doubt that there was no question of any rules and regulations in those days, and players at a distance of a meter from the previous hole made the first stroke.įollowing the officially recognized data, the birthplace of modern golf is Scotland. In ancient golf, hitting a stone with a device resembling modern clubs and moving it along natural fields, players chased the stone, overcoming obstacles such as rabbit traps, sand embankments, animal trails that appear on the fields in the wild. Italians give examples that Roman soldiers back in the time of the Rome Empire used a ball made from leather while playing with sticks bent at the bottom to maintain physical shape. Another theory says that golfing game was introduced in China in the times of the Ming Dynasty, as evidenced by a scroll with the image of the emperor, who was making an attempt to kick the ball in an opening with something similar to a club. Although many historians disagree with this, there is also a belief that the entertainment appeared in the Rome, where it was performed with bent sticks and with a blob filled with plumage. However, it is generally believed that the Scottish shepherds who tried to roll stones into rabbit holes with their staff are the pioneers of this game (Browning, 2018). The exact date of the origin of golf is still unknown.
