Origin of Hockey 

Most historians place the origin of hockey in the chilly climes of northern Europe, specifically Great Britain and France, where field hockey was a popular summer sport more than 500 years ago. When the ponds and lakes froze in winter, it was not unusual for the athletes who fancied that sport to play a version of it on ice. 

An ice game known as kolven was popular in Holland in the 17th century, and later on the game really took hold in England. In his book, Fischler's Illustrated History of Hockey, veteran hockey journalist and broadcaster Stan Fischler writes about a rudimentary version of the sport becoming popular in the English marshland community of Bury Fen in the 1820s. 
The game, he explains, was called bandy, and the local players used to scramble around the town's frozen meadowlands, swatting a wooden or cork ball, known as a kit or cat, with wooden sticks made from the branches of local willow trees. Articles in London newspapers around that time mention increasing interest in the sport, which many observers believe got its name from the French word hoquet, which means "shepherd's crook" or "bent stick." A number of writers thought this game should be forbidden because it was so disruptive to people out for a leisurely winter skate.
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