sphairistic

comparative more sphairistic · superlative most sphairistic

1. historicalrareOf, like, or pertaining to tennis; tending to play tennis, especially lawn tennis, with crebrity.

   If you are sphairistic, you are playing tennis.

   2007, Barbara Ann Kipfer, Word Nerd: More Than 17,000 Fascinating Facts about Words, Sourcebooks - The Pennsylvania State University Press, page 483

   5 more examples

   Finally he turned to the huge volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary where he found that the word 'sphairistic', labelled 'rare', meant tennis playing.

   1987, Denis Joseph Grogan, Enquiries and the Reference Process - Grogan's Case Studies in Reference Work, Clive Bingley - The Michigan University Press, page 21

   Some rare words are learned formations, such as 'sphairistic' meaning 'lawn-tennis-playing'

   1977, Dannie Abse, More Words, British Broadcasting Corporation Publications, page 59

   I hope it will not be taken amiss if I say that, while we have no objection to people walking behind the bowler's arm when the bowler is Australian, we deprecate its sphairistic equivalent.

   1975, Periodical Magazine Article Authors, The New Yorker - Volume 51 - Issues 20 to 27, F-R Publishing Corporation - The Indiana University Press, page 77

   The World of June 14, 1882, was writing: 'Lawn-tennis has not to answer for many accidents, so that two in a week among the sphairistic ladies of Ireland seems alarming.' Croquet as a country-house pastime could not compete with the new …

   1954, F.C. Westley, The Spectator - Volume 193, The Michigan University Press, page 88

   When, exactly a century, Major Wall Clopton Wingfield issued the early rules on the sphairistic.

   1973, Brown & Merry, Country Life, Volume 154, Country Life - Limited - The Michigan University Press, page 2024