ABSTRACT

Women’s rugby, as recognised today, evolved as part of the women’s sport revolution during the 1970s. However, the rich history of women playing rugby union stretches back to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including pioneers in New Zealand, France and Great Britain. The social context of early women’s rugby is critical to understanding the factors that made the sport unsustainable prior to the 1970s. The fragmentary history of women’s rugby includes attempts to form a professional touring squad in New Zealand, charitable fundraising matches by wartime factory workers in Wales and established leagues with law adaptations to make the game more “ladylike” in France. Each event arose independently, with no evidence to suggest causality or links between them. As such, the early examples of female participation in rugby union do not represent the origins of the modern game. Instead, these diverse, transnational examples highlight the barriers women tackled throughout the long and nuanced history of women’s rugby union.