tennis

Etymology

Old French tenez, second-person imperative of tenir (“hold”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɛ.nɪs/
• Rhymes: -ɛnɪs

Noun

tennis (usually uncountable, plural tennises)

1. (sports) A sport played by two players (or four in doubles), who alternately strike the ball over a net using racquets.
   • 1935, George Goodchild, chapter 1, in Death on the Centre Court:

     “Anthea hasn't a notion in her head but to vamp a lot of silly mugwumps. She's set her heart on that tennis bloke […] whom the papers are making such a fuss about.”

2. (dated) A match in this sport.
   • 1918, Violet Hunt, The Last Ditch (page 95)

     We go about to parties in the daytime as usual, teas and tennises […]

3. (obsolete) An earlier game in which a ball is driven to and fro, or kept in motion by striking it with a racquet or with the open hand.
   • (Can we find and add a quotation of Shakespeare to this entry?)
   • Thomas Macaulay (1800-1859)

     His easy bow, his good stories, his style of dancing and playing tennis, […] were familiar to all London.

Verb

tennis (third-person singular simple present tennises, present participle tennising, simple past and past participle tennised)

1. (intransitive, dated) To play tennis.
2. (transitive) To drive backward and forward like a tennis ball.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Spenser to this entry?)

See also

• table tennis or ping pong

Anagrams

• innest, nestin, sennit, sinnet, tensin

Noun

tennis m (uncountable)

1. tennis

Noun

tennis c (definite singular tennissen or tennisen)

1. (uncountable, sports) tennis

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɛ.nəs/

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ten‧nis

Etymology 1

Borrowed from English tennis.

Etymology 2

See etymology on the main entry.

Anagrams

• intens

Noun

tennis (genitive tennise, partitive tennist)

1. tennis

Etymology

From English tennis.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtenːis/
• Hyphenation: ten‧nis

Noun

tennis

1. tennis

Etymology

Borrowed from English tennis.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /te.nis/

• audio

  (file)

Noun

tennis m (plural tennis)

1. (usually uncountable) tennis
2. (countable, Europe, dated) sneaker

Further reading

• “tennis” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtʰɛnːɪs/
• Rhymes: -ɛnːɪs

Noun

tennis m (genitive singular tenniss, no plural)

1. tennis

Anagrams

• steinn

Noun

tennis m (invariable)

1. tennis

Noun

tennis m (definite singular tennisen) (uncountable)

1. (sports) tennis

Noun

tennis m (definite singular tennisen) (uncountable)

1. (sports) tennis

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

tennis c (definite singular tennisen)

1. (uncountable, sports) tennis