More on Strath

Mike Clayton elaborates on his original story about Davie Strath and also writes about the headstone unveiling ceremony that took place in Melbourne.

Finding Strath

Mike Clayton writes in The Age about Melbourne golfer Noel Terry and his discovery of David Strath's grave in Australia, solving one of golfs great mysteries.

Strath's golfing story is an interesting one. He was the rival and friend of the greatest player of the time, Young Tom Morris, who won the Open Championship four times in a row from 1868 to 1872 (there was no championship in 1871). The pair toured Scotland and as far south as Liverpool in England playing exhibition matches, sometimes in front of 10,000 people.

They were the superstars of their time and are credited with popularising the game. Strath was runner-up to Morris in the Open Championships of 1870 and 1872 and in 1876 he tied for the championship at St Andrews but refused to play off because of a rules dispute.

That Open was a shambles as someone had forgotten to book the golf course and players were competing amongst the regular public players. Strath's long approach to the 17th green had hit a spectator on the green and there were protests that he had somehow gained an advantage. He was asked to play off for the title with the undertaking that the question would be settled when an official was available to adjudicate.

Strath refused, reasoning there was little point if he was going to have the crown taken away in the following days.

"Settle it now or I won't be here in the morning" was his not-unreasonable request.

Roman Soldiers: Golf Inventors?

Thanks to reader Chris for the heads up on the response in the British Isles to recent claims that China was the home of golf, not Scotland.

Now it seems Roman soldiers invented a form of golf that the Scots formalized, sending HBO and the BBC back to the storyboards for a revamp to season two of Rome.

Jim McBeth writes:

THEY came, they saw, they played a neat chip shot onto the edge of the green. More than a millennium before golf is said to have been invented in Scotland, Roman soldiers were playing the game, according to experts.

Trumping recent claims that the game was being played in China in AD943, academics have chipped in with a theory that the game was actually imported to Scotland by the foot soldiers of Emperor Severus.

The Roman version of golf was called paganica, and was first recorded in 30BC as a generic ball game. However, by the time of the Roman invasion of Scotland, it was played with a curved stick used to strike a feather-filled leather ball. The ball was hit towards a predetermined target such as a tree, the aim being to strike the “mark” in the fewest strokes.

Michael Whitby, a historian at Warwick University, said: “Legionaries were in Scotland from the AD140s. The Emperor Severus was on the Fife Peninsula and, significantly, there was an important marching camp near St Andrews.

“A legacy of games, such as paganica, would have been left. The roots of golf would have passed through the 8th century to the medieval university folk and aristocrats.”

Malcolm Campbell, a leading golf writer, agreed: “Paganica is the earliest form of a game we could recognise as golf. After the Romans left, it evolved and in the 15th century the Scots uniquely formalised it. The game was truly ‘invented’ in Scotland, with a little help from the Romans.”

Golf Started In China?!

Richard Starnes in the Ottawa Citizen writes:

A leading academic says he has proof golf was played in China 500 years before it was first reported in Scotland, which is widely acknowledged as the game's home.

Professor Ling Hongling of Lanzhou University says he has unearthed clear references to golf in a book called the Dongzuan Records, which were compiled during the Song Dynasty (AD 960-1279). There are even sketches.

Ling says the book also refers to a prominent Nantang Dynasty magistrate (AD 937-975) who told his daughter "to dig goals in the ground so that he might drive a ball into them with a purposely crafted stick." The fact the "sticks" were jewel-encrusted suggests the game was for the nobleman, not the commoner.

Jewel-encrusted sticks. A game for the nobleman. So now we know: blame the Chinese.

Thanks to reader Al for the heads up.