10 Oldest Golf Clubs in the World
Producing an overview of the world’s oldest golf clubs – as distinct from courses – isn’t a perfect science. Sadly, some of the documentation has been lost in the mists of time. Nonetheless, there is evidence enough to suggest that these are the ten oldest clubs in the world.
Of these, the one slightly confusing history relates to the loan club residing in England, Royal Blackheath. It celebrated its quadricentennial in 2008, with its institution as 1608, which would clearly make it the oldest in the world. Most do not really dispute this, including the greatest golf correspondent of all time, Bernard Darwin. However, the oldest existing evidence for Royal Blackheath is a silver club presented for a competition in 1766 and played for ever since. So even if not the oldest in the world, it is certainly the oldest in England and indeed outside of Scotland.
There is a big difference between a list of the oldest clubs and the oldest courses, and as you would expect, most of the oldest clubs have relocated and no longer play on their original layout. Here then, is a brief introduction to the 10 oldest golf clubs in the world, most of whom have a more detailed account of their history on their websites.
1 – Royal Burgess Golfing Society (1735)
Looking back down the closing hole at Royal Burgess
(Image credit: Jeremy Ellwood)
- Location Edinburgh
- Founded 1735
- Architect Willie Park Junior, James Braid, Philip Mackenzie Ross
- GF Round £175, Day £250
- Par 71, 6,531 yards
- Contact Royal Burgess Golfing Society (opens in new tab)
If we set Royal Blackheath at 1766 based on the oldest club competition still being played there, then Royal Burgess is the oldest golf club in the world. It was instituted in 1733, at which point the members of the society played over a 6-hole course on Bruntsfield Links near the castle. They have since enjoyed various homes, including Musselburgh Links, and now play over a fine and very well maintained parkland course on the western outskirts of Edinburgh.
2 – Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers (1744)
The closing hole and clubhouse at Muirfield, home to the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers
(Image credit: Getty Images)
There cannot be too many world-famous golf courses where most golfers would struggle to tell you the name of the parent club, but this is one! In 1744, Edinburgh Town Council presented a silver club to the winner of an annual golf competition that took place on the Links of Leith. In return,…
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