Golf. Orig. Sc. [app. a curtailed form of teaz, used in 17th c., the origin of which is not ascertained. For the formation cf. pease, pea.] The starting-place, usually a little heap of earth or sand, from which the ball is driven in commencing to play each hole.
1673. Wedderburn’s Vocab., 37. 38 (Jam.). Baculus, Pila clavaria, a goulfe-ball. Statumen, the Teaz.
1721. Ramsay, Ode to Ph—, ii. Driving their baws frae whins or tee.
1875. W. A. Smith, Lewsiana, 147. Each [shell] is seated on a sandy ‘tee,’ formed by the wind sweeping away the sand around it.
1879. Encycl. Brit., X. 765/1. In starting from the hole, the ball may be teed (i.e. placed where the player chooses, with a little pinch of sand under it called a tee).
1905. Daily News, 7 Jan., 12. At two o’clock,… the golfing party were at the first tee.
attrib. 1901. Daily Chron., 7 June, 8/3. Vardon was beaten in the tee shots.
