Ball#Different types of balls

The first known use of the word ball in English in the sense of a globular body that is played with was in 1205 in Layamon's Brut, or Chronicle of Britain in the phrase, "{{lang|la|Summe heo driuen balles wide ȝeond Þa feldes.}}" ("Some of them drove balls far across the fields.") The word came from the Middle English bal (inflected as ball-e, -es), in turn from Old Norse böllr (pronounced {{IPA|non|bɔlːr|}}; compare Old Swedish baller, and Swedish boll) from Proto-Germanic ballu-z (whence probably Middle High German bal, ball-es, Middle Dutch bal), a cognate with Old High German ballo, pallo, Middle High German balle from Proto-Germanic *ballon (weak masculine), and Old High German ballâ, pallâ, Middle High German balle, Proto-Germanic *ballôn (weak feminine). No Old English cognate of any of these is known. (The hypothetical corresponding forms in Old English would have been beallu, -a, -e—compare bealluc, ballock.) If ball- was native in Germanic, it may have been a cognate with the Latin foll-is in sense of a "thing blown up or inflated." In the later Middle English spelling balle the word coincided graphically with the French balle "ball" and "bale" which has hence been erroneously assumed to be its source. French balle (but not boule) is assumed to be of Germanic origin, itself, however. In Ancient Greek the word πάλλα (palla) for "ball" is attested[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Dpa%2Flla&highlight=ball πάλλα] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924204511/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0057:entry=pa%2Flla&highlight=ball |date=2015-09-24 }}, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus besides the word σφαίρα (sfaíra), sphere.[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3Dsfai%3Dra^&highlight=ball σφαίρα] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170320052243/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0057:entry%3Dsfai%3Dra%5E&highlight=ball |date=2017-03-20 }}, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus

File:Russian balls 12-13.jpg balls ({{Langx|ru|мячи}}), 12th-13th century.]]

Some form of game with a ball is found portrayed on Egyptian monuments.{{Cite web |last=Egypt State Information Service |title=Ancient Egyptian Sport |url=https://www.sis.gov.eg/section/10/733?lang=en-us |access-date=2024-05-27}} In Homer, Nausicaa was playing at ball with her maidens when Odysseus first saw her in the land of the Phaeacians (Od. vi. 100). And Halios and Laodamas performed before Alcinous and Odysseus with ball play, accompanied with dancing (Od. viii. 370). The most ancient balls in Eurasia have been discovered in Karasahr, China and are 3000 years old. They were made of hair-filled leather.{{cite web|url= https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/leather-balls-point-ancient-chinese-sport-180976102/|title=These Hair-Filled Leather Pouches Are the Oldest Balls Found in Eurasia|last=Gershon|first=Livia|date=October 21, 2020|website=www.smithsonianmag.com|publisher=Smithsonian Institution|access-date=November 2, 2020}}

Among the ancient Greeks, games with balls (σφαῖραι) were regarded as a useful subsidiary to the more violent athletic exercises, as a means of keeping the body supple, and rendering it graceful, but were generally left to boys and girls. Of regular rules for the playing of ball games, little trace remains, if there were any such. The names in Greek for various forms, which have come down to us in such works as the Ὀνομαστικόν of Julius Pollux, imply little or nothing of such; thus, ἀπόρραξις (aporraxis) only means the putting of the ball on the ground with the open hand, οὐρανία (ourania), the flinging of the ball in the air to be caught by two or more players; φαινίνδα (phaininda) would seem to be a game of catch played by two or more, where feinting is used as a test of quickness and skill. Pollux (i. x. 104) mentions a game called episkyros (ἐπίσκυρος), which has often been looked on as the origin of football. It seems to have been played by two sides, arranged in lines; how far there was any form of "goal" seems uncertain.{{Cite EB1911|wstitle=Ball}} It was impossible to produce a ball that was perfectly spherical;{{cite book|last=Garland|first=Robert|date=2008|title=Ancient Greece: Everyday Life in the Birthplace of Western Civilization|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-R1PmAEACAAJ&q=Ancient+Greece:+Everyday+Life+in+the+Birthplace+of+Western+Civilization|publisher=Sterling|location=New York City, New York|isbn=978-1-4549-0908-8|page=96}} children usually made their own balls by inflating pig's bladders and heating them in the ashes of a fire to make them rounder, although Plato (fl. 420s BC – 340s BC) described "balls which have leather coverings in twelve pieces".{{cite book

| author = Plato

| author-link = Plato

| editor = Charles W. Eliot

| translator = Benjamin Jowett

| title = The Apology, Phædo and Crito of Plato – The Golden Sayings of Epictetus – The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius

| chapter-url = https://archive.org/details/harvardclassics002elio/page/107

| access-date = May 16, 2020

| edition = 1st

| series = The Harvard Classics

| volume = 2

| year = 1909

| publisher = P. F. Collier and Son

| location = New York

| page = 107

| chapter = Phædo (Dialogues of Plato)

}}

Among the Romans, ball games were looked upon as an adjunct to the bath, and were graduated to the age and health of the bathers, and usually a place (sphaeristerium) was set apart for them in the baths (thermae). There appear to have been three types or sizes of ball, the pila, or small ball, used in catching games, the paganica, a heavy ball stuffed with feathers, and the follis, a leather ball filled with air, the largest of the three. This was struck from player to player, who wore a kind of gauntlet on the arm. There was a game known as trigon, played by three players standing in the form of a triangle, and played with the follis, and also one known as harpastum, which seems to imply a "scrimmage" among several players for the ball. These games are known to us through the Romans, though the names are Greek.

File:How_to_play_basket_ball;_a_thesis_on_the_technique_of_the_game_(IA_howtoplaybasketb02mess).pdf

The various modern games played with a ball or balls and subject to rules are treated under their various names, such as polo, cricket, football, etc.

In sports, many modern balls are pressurized. Some are pressurized at the factory (e.g. tennis, squash) and others are pressurized by users (e.g. volleyball, basketball, football). Almost all pressurized balls gradually leak air. If the ball is factory pressurized, there is usually a rule about whether the ball retains sufficient pressure to remain playable.{{Cite web |date=2015-08-10 |title=Preparing the Footballs for NFL Games {{!}} NFL Football Operations |url=https://operations.nfl.com/updates/the-game/preparing-the-footballs-for-nfl-games/ |access-date=2023-11-01 |website=operations.nfl.com |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |last=LaCombe |first=Ronnie |title=How much air can fit in a basketball? |url=https://www.columbiatribune.com/story/lifestyle/family/2018/04/03/how-much-air-can-fit/985314007/ |access-date=2023-11-02 |website=Columbia Daily Tribune |language=en-US}} Depressurized balls lack bounce and are often termed "dead". In extreme cases, a dead ball becomes flaccid. If the ball is pressured on use, there are generally rules about how the ball is pressurized before the match, and when (or whether) the ball can be repressurized or replaced.

Due to the ideal gas law, ball pressure is a function of temperature, generally tracking ambient conditions. Softer balls that are struck hard (especially squash balls) increase in temperature due to inelastic collision.

In outdoor sports, wet balls play differently than dry balls. In indoor sports, balls may become damp due to hand sweat. Any form of humidity or dampness will affect a ball's surface friction, which will alter a player's ability to impart spin on the ball. The action required to apply spin to a ball is governed by the physics of angular momentum. Spinning balls travelling through air (technically a fluid) will experience the Magnus effect, which can produce lateral deflections in addition to the normal up-down curvature induced by a combination of wind resistance and gravity.

File:Green Rubber Band Ball.jpg|Rubber band ball

File:Black Super Ball.jpg|Super Ball

File:A cherry utility ball in a field (cropped).jpg|Utility ball

File:Sponge Ball.jpg|Sponge ball

File:Amerikansk fotboll i plast - 2025.jpg|Plastic american football.

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• Ball (mathematics)
• Buckminster Fullerene "Bucky balls"
• Dryer ball, used in a tumbling dryer
• Football (ball)
• Hockey puck, can also spin, bounce, and roll
• Kickball
• Marbles
• Penny floater
• Prisoner Ball
• Shuttlecock
• Super Ball

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{{Wiktionary|ball}}

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Category:Spheres