Golf History: The 13 Very First Rules of Golf

Rules of golf have been around since the very beginning of golf. Just what those very first rules of golf were, no one can quite say today. One thing is certain: The first written rules of golf date back to the middle of the 18th century. They were drawn up in 1744 by the Gentlemen Golfers of Leith (today known as the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers of Muirfield), one of the oldest golf clubs in the world.

It all started with 13 rules of golf

Many of the initial 13 rules of golf still exist today, albeit in modified form:

1. You must tee up the golf ball within one club length (tees now measure two club lengths in depth).
2. Your tee must be on the ground (tee used to mean small pyramids of sand).
3. You are not allowed to change the ball with which you tee off (the one-ball rule goes back to a long tradition – currently the rule can be found in Golf Rule 15 with a few modifications).
4. You are not allowed to remove stones, bones or broken club parts to play the ball. The fairway is an exception. There, you are allowed to remove small obstructions within a radius of one club length from the ball (bones may sound strange – today, small obstructions are summarized as loose obstructive natural materials in Golf Rule 23).
5. If your ball lands in water or any type of watery debris, you are free to pick it up and re-putt behind the hazard. You may then play the ball with any club, but you will incur a penalty stroke against your opponent (origin of the penalty stroke rule for water hazards – Golf Rule 26).
6. If your ball interferes with your opponent’s ball(s), you may pick it up until the last ball is played (Rule of Golf 22-2).
7. When putting your golf ball in the hole, you should honestly hit the ball only in the direction of the hole and not in the direction of the opponent’s balls in order to play them out.
8. If you lose your ball because you gave it up or for any other reason, you must return to the point from which you last teed off. You will receive a penalty stroke for this (Golf Rule 27-1).
9. No one is allowed to mark the ideal line to the hole with their club or anything else while putting (embedded in Golf Rule 8-2).
10. If a ball is stopped by a person, horse, dog, or anything else, the stopped ball must be played from the position where it came to rest (“play it as it lies”; per Golf Rule 19-1).
11. If you swing your club to tee off, but you lower it again, even without actually hitting the ball, the movement is counted as a stroke played (definition of a stroke).
12. During the game, the ball that is farthest from the hole is always played (almost unchanged after all this time: golf rule 10).
13. Neither ditches, streams or dams built to protect and delimit the golf course, nor construction sites located on the course should be seen as obstacles. The ball is to be picked up, re-putted and played with any club.

The Rules of Golf have evolved over time, taking a giant leap in 1897 when the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews (R&A) formed a Rules Committee. Since 1952, the R&A and the United States Golf Association (USGA) have met every two years.