Is there any event that heralds the start of the English summer more evocatively than Wimbledon ? The oldest tennis championship in the world is famous for strawberries and cream , closely cropped grass, the threat of rain, Centre Court and, of course, the sexagesimal system. Well, perhaps sexagesimal – the system of counting that uses base 60 – isn't the first thing that springs to mind, although it is inherent to tennis' rather unique scoring system. But we'll get to that. Let's begin at the beginning. Why does each game, each set and indeed each match begin at "love all"? Why do tennis aficionados use the word "love" when they mean zero? My favourite explanation is that the French began to use the term "l'oeuf" – meaning "the egg" – to denote a score of zero because of an egg's similarity in shape to a nice, round, oval 0, and also possibly because of the egg's associations with new beginnings. This link between the egg-shape and the number 0 is not without parallel. In cricket, we still refer to a batter who gets out without scoring as having made a "duck", short for "duck's egg". In baseball, our American… Read full this story
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