volleyball (English)

Where does "volleyball" come from?

The English noun 'volleyball' is a compound formed from 'volley' and 'ball'[1]. The component 'volley' traces back through Middle French 'volée' meaning 'flight', Vulgar Latin 'volta', and Late Latin 'volatus' from the Latin verb 'volō' meaning 'I fly'[3][8]. The component 'ball' derives from Middle English 'bal' and 'ball', stemming from either an unattested Old English form '*beall' or Old Norse 'bǫllr', both tracing back to Proto-Germanic and ultimately to the Proto-Indo-European root '*bʰel-' meaning 'to blow, inflate, swell'[2]. The game itself was created in 1895 in Holyoke, Massachusetts, by William G. Morgan, and was initially called 'Mintonette'[1]. After an observer noted the volleying nature of the sport during its first exhibition match in 1896, it became known as 'volley ball'[1].

Open questions

• The Old English form '*beall' is unattested and reconstructed from later developments. [2] [6]

Full etymology tree

• volleyball (English), 'A game played on a rectangular court between two teams of two to six players which involves striking a ball back and forth over a net.'
  • compound volley (English), 'The simultaneous firing of a number of missiles or bullets; the projectiles so fired.'
    • borrowed volée (Middle French)
      • derived volta (Latin), 'nominative/accusative/vocative plural of voltum'
        • derived volatus (Latin), 'flown, having been flown, flew'
          • derived volo (Latin), 'to fly'
  • compound ball (English), 'A solid or hollow sphere, or roughly spherical mass.'
    • inherited bal (Middle English), 'A ball (an object of spherical shape)'

Ancestors

• *gʷelH- (Proto-Indo-European)
• volley (English)
• ball (English)

Descendants and derived words

• ဘော်လီဘော (Burmese)
• voleibol (Catalan)
• volejbal (Czech)
• beach volleyball (English)
• kick volleyball (English)
• rebound volleyball (English)
• sand volleyball (English)
• sitting volleyball (English)
• volleyballene (English)
• volleyballer (English)
• volleyball player (English)
• wallyball (English)

Related words

• net (English)
• court (English)
• serve (English)
• ball (English)
• block (English)

Sources

1. volleyball (English) - Wiktionary
2. ball (English) - Wiktionary
3. volley (English) - Wiktionary
4. bal (Middle English) - Wiktionary
5. balluz (Proto-Germanic) - Wiktionary
6. beall (Old English) - Wiktionary
7. bǫllr (Old Norse) - Wiktionary
8. volatus (Latin) - Wiktionary

Updated October 2026

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Etymology data from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · About Miraris