Soccer

[RichardB]

Who first called it "Soccer" and what did it mean ?

[Guest Old Canny Street Kid]

Who first called it "Soccer" and what did it mean ?

I have just been reading about Ernest Dowson (1867-1900) on Wikipedia, and his biog suggests that he was one of the first to use the word soccer, although he spelt it socca. See also soccer in OED.

I think soccer comes from an abbreviation of asSOCiAtion football.

[RichardB]

I have just been reading about Ernest Dowson (1867-1900) on Wikipedia, and his biog suggests that he was one of the first to use the word soccer, although he spelt it socca. See also soccer in OED.

I think soccer comes from an abbreviation of asSOCiAtion football.

The answer I found :

Charles Wreford Brown (Corinthians) - page 164 From Sheffield with Love - Soccer = abbreviation of Association - strangely no year mentioned, more hunting needed then !

[RichardB]

The answer I found :

Charles Wreford Brown (Corinthians) - page 164 From Sheffield with Love - Soccer = abbreviation of Association - strangely no year mentioned, more hunting needed then !

Charles W. Brown also born 1867 or thereabouts; 1881 Scholar, Charterhouse, Godalming, Surrey (Head of Household Henry James Evans, obviously)

[Guest Old Canny Street Kid]

Charles W. Brown also born 1867 or thereabouts; 1881 Scholar, Charterhouse, Godalming, Surrey (Head of Household Henry James Evans, obviously)

Ernest Dowson, being a writer and poet, may have been the first (or one of the first) to use 'soccer' in print. He attended Queen's College, Oxford. Remembering that football thrived in the universities and public schools before it became "the people's game", you could well imagine some of the posh young gents calling association football 'soccer' as an abbreviation. Today, I think most people would call it simply football, and 'soccer' still sounds rather too posh!

Dowson, by the way, is credited with coining the phrases 'gone with the wind' and 'the days of wine and roses' --and a line in another of his poems suggests he put the idea of "always true to you, dear, in my fashion" into the mind of Cole Porter! Gosh, the things you learn when you start researching a word called soccer.