{"id":6268,"date":"2018-07-12T14:26:22","date_gmt":"2018-07-12T13:26:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/?p=6268"},"modified":"2026-08-17T18:12:54","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T17:12:54","slug":"french-and-the-language-of-love-deuce-let-and-tennis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/en\/news\/french-and-the-language-of-love-deuce-let-and-tennis","title":{"rendered":"French and the Language of Love, Deuce, Let and Tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Young<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Check out this quick guide to tennis terminology and where it comes from.  (Answer: mostly French!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to some experts, love<\/em><\/strong> in tennis may come from the French word for egg, l\u2019oeuf<\/em>, because an egg looks like a zero.  Others insist it\u2019s so named because the game is being played for love<\/em> ie without any bets being placed.  Ironically, the French don\u2019t use the word love<\/em> in their game.  They call it zero.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Deuce<\/em><\/strong> (so called when the score reaches 40-40 in tennis) is also thought to come from the French.  It could derive from the word deus<\/em>, Old French for two or from \u00e0 deux de jeu<\/em> (meaning two points from the end of the game).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let<\/em><\/strong> (when a ball hits the net when it\u2019s being served) could have got its name because the umpire \u201clets\u201d you try again.   Although another possibility is that it\u2019s short for filet<\/em>, the French word for net.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, the word tennis<\/em><\/strong> is believed to come from the French word \u201ctenez\u201d (from the verb tenir) meaning to hold, receive or take.   Originally it was called out by the server to let their opponent know a ball was about to come their way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For other French words and phrases, like the ones below, try uTalk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Est-ce que vous jouez au tennis ?<\/em> (Do you play tennis?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Je pr\u00e9f\u00e8re le football.<\/em>  (I prefer football.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not got uTalk French yet?\u00a0\u00a0Try out uTalk French<\/a>, and get 40% off. Instant access, available on all your devices.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Check out this quick guide to tennis terminology and where it comes from.  (Answer: mostly French!) According to some experts,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":6269,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[46],"class_list":["post-6268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-learn-french","tag-culture"],"acf":[],"lang":"en","translations":{"en":6268,"da":9084,"de":9141,"it":9089},"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":49,"label":"French"}],"post_tag":[{"value":46,"label":"culture"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/ThinkstockPhotos-520466283-700x467.jpg",700,467,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Sarah","author_link":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/en\/news\/author\/sarah"},"comment_info":3,"category_info":[{"term_id":49,"name":"French","slug":"learn-french","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":49,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":37,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":49,"category_count":37,"category_description":"","cat_name":"French","category_nicename":"learn-french","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":46,"name":"culture","slug":"culture","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":46,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":48,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6268"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9148,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6268\/revisions\/9148"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}