Croquet on croquet, was an event at the 1904 Summer Olympics. As with similar words with a French derivation, the final 't' is silent. British pronunciation puts the accent on the first syllable, American on the second: versus . Association croquet is the name of an advanced game of croquet, played at international level. It involves four balls teamed in pairs, with both balls going through every hoop for one pair to win. The game's distinguishing feature is the "croquet" shot: when certain balls hit other balls, extra shots are allowed. The six hoops are arranged three at each end of
Croquet (depending on whether sticks were used), was regularly played in France and southern Britain between villages or parishes; it was attested in Cornwall as early as 1283. In the book "Queen of Games: The History of Croquet", Nicky Smith presents two theories of the origin of the modern game of croquet, which took England by storm in the 1860s and then spread overseas. The first explanation is that the ancestral game was introduced to Britain from France during the 1630–1685 reign of Charles II of England, and was played under the name of ' (among other spellings, today usually "pall-mall"),