A Tennis Racket and a Criminal Racket Are Different Words
A racket is a bat with strings, a loud noise, and an illegal scheme. Only two of the three are connected.
A racket is the strung bat used in tennis, from Arabic *rahat*, the palm of the hand. The noise and the criminal scheme are a separate word of unknown origin, and the criminal sense grew from the noise — a *racket* was a disturbance, then a scheme conducted under cover of one. The tennis bat is unrelated to both.
- A strung bat. *A tennis racket.*
- A loud noise. *What a racket.*
- An illegal scheme. *A protection racket.*
- Racketeering — organised crime. *Charged with racketeering.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | racket | A carbon racket. |
| Plural | rackets | Two rackets. |
| Variant | racquet | A squash racquet. |
| Noun | racketeer | A convicted racketeer. |
| Related | rahat | Arabic *rahat*, palm. |
How it is used in a sentence
- Racket comes from the Arabic for palm.The hand once struck the ball directly.
- A protection racket demands payment.For safety from the demander.
- Racquet is a variant spelling.Chiefly for squash and real tennis.
Tennis vocabulary
- Love — zero, possibly from French *l'oeuf*
- Deuce — from French *à deux*, two points needed
- Tennis — possibly from French *tenez*, take it
- Racket — from Arabic *rahat*, the palm
- Real tennis — the older indoor game from which lawn tennis derives
The bat comes through French from Arabic *rahat al-yad*, the palm of the hand. The noise is of unknown origin.
Racket or racquet?
Both are correct. Racket is more common in tennis, racquet in squash and real tennis.
Are the two rackets related?
No. The bat comes from Arabic; the noise and the criminal scheme come from a separate word of unknown origin.