this is an interesting and very historic token. Tennis was an illegal game at one point but has been played in Oxford since the Sixteenth Century. there were a number of courts, often situated at the rear of public houses.
Thomas Wood working under Jane
Hallam’s licence obtained in 1647 a licence ‘to hang out the sign of the
Salutation in St. Martin’s parish.’ In 1651 he obtained from Katherine Edwards
a lease of a tenement (No. 104, High Street) in St. Mary’s parish, together
with a licence to sell wine. This house belonged to Oriel College and behind it
and No. 105, High Street, lay a tennis-court (now lecture-rooms of the college)
Obv: Thomas Wood; tennis
racquet in centre; Rev: *VINTNER-IN-OXON.1652/W T M.
images by kind permission of Ashmolean Museum
HCR6521 Farthing (quarter penny) token of the tennis court keeper Thomas Wood,
Oxford 1652 © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford.
information from various sources and
17th and 18th Century Wine-Bottles of Oxford Taverns - Oxoniensia
oxoniensia.org/vol%206/Leeds.doc
by ET LEEDS -
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