racket [LME] In Middle English this was a game a bit like modern squash or real tennis (see pillar), a sense surviving in the modern game of rackets, only appearing as the bat used to hit the ball around 1500. The word comes via French from an Italian term for ‘palm of the hand’, for the ball was originally hit with the hand. The noisy sort of racket is a separate word, which appeared in the mid 16th century, perhaps in imitation of the noise. The sort of racket [E19th] practised by a racketeer [E20th] seems to have evolved from this.