# Difference between an Umpire and Referee **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 19, 2003, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377 "2003-10-19T16:24:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![PetW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d2c977/32.png) [@PetW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PetW)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/1 "2003-10-19T16:24:42Z")
Why are the ref’s in baseball called umpires as opposed to most other sport’s referees? How did this come about? I was really surprised to not find this when I was searching the archives. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/2 "2003-10-19T17:11:08Z")
From [dictionary.com](http://dictionary.com) > [@](#): > > [Middle English (an) oumpere, (an) umpire, alteration of (a) noumpere, a mediator, from Old French nonper : non-, non- + per, equal, even, paired (from Latin pr. See pair).] > > Word History: Had it not been for the linguistic process known as false splitting or juncture loss, the angry, anguished cry “Kill the ump” could have been “Kill the nump.” In the case of umpire we can almost see this process in action by studying the Middle English Dictionary entry for noumpere, the Middle English ancestor of our word. Noumpere comes from the Old French nonper, made up of non, “not,” and per, “equal”: as an impartial arbiter of a dispute between two people, the arbiter is not equivalent to or a partisan of either of them. In Middle English the earliest recorded form is noumper (about 1350); the earliest dated form without an n is owmpere, from 1440. How the n was lost can be seen if we compare the sequence a noounpier in a text written in 1426-1427 with the sequence an Oumper from a text written probably around 1475. The n of noumpere has here become attached to the indefinite article, giving us an instead of a and, eventually, umpire instead of \*numpire. The same process of false splitting is responsible for the forms apron and adder, originally napron and naddre, as well as many other words that once began with n. False splitting also caused some words that originally began with vowels to have an n from a preceding indefinite article added on, such as nickname (from the phrase an eke name) and newt (from an eute). [word-detective.com](http://word-detective.com) > [@](#): > > Onward. The original form of “umpire” in English was the 14th century English word “noumpere,” from the French words for “not a peer,” and that takes some explaining. “Peer” in this sense means “equal,” or someone who has a stake in the matter at hand. Today we may think of umpires primarily as the beleaguered mediators of baseball games, but the original role of an “umpire” was to serve as an impartial arbitrator of legal disputes. This legal function still exists, although the umpires are usually called “arbitrators.” Naturally, the arbitrator, like the umpire in a baseball game, must be rigorously impartial and not a “peer,” or member of either team, for the process to work. > > Now the curious thing about “noumpere” is that it only looks a little like “umpire.” It begins with an “n,” for example – where did that go? Well, it drifted, through a linguistic process called “metanalysis,” in which letters from one word migrate over time to a neighboring word. So “a noumpere” in the 14th century became "an umpere"in the 15th century and finally, by the early 17th century, “an umpire.” A similar metanalytic process transformed “a napron” (related to “napkin”) to our modern “an apron” and “a nadder” became that slithery menace, “an adder.” ---
**Author:** ![PetW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d2c977/32.png) [@PetW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PetW)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/3 "2003-10-19T17:13:18Z")
yes, but why is it called one thing in baseball and another thing in virtually all other (American) sports? ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/4 "2003-10-19T17:36:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by PetW \* > \*\*yes, but why is it called one thing in baseball and another thing in virtually all other (American) sports? \*\* Umm… IIRC cricket predated baseball and used "umpires. Some of the first organized games were played on “cricket grounds” by the Knickerbockers in New York ---
**Author:** ![PetW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d2c977/32.png) [@PetW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PetW)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/5 "2003-10-19T17:42:57Z")
Alright, I just didn’t know if there was some story or reason why it is referee in basketball and umpire in baseball. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/6 "2003-10-19T17:49:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by PetW \* > \*\*Alright, I just didn’t know if there was some story or reason why it is referee in basketball and umpire in baseball. \*\* Other “gentleman’s” games (which baseball was originally), of the time like polo, also used an “umpire” so it’s not stretch as to why gentleman baseball players would have adopted the word. On the flip side how did the word “referee” develop? ---
**Author:** ![Billdo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/billdo/32/315_2.png) [@Billdo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Billdo)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2003, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/7 "2003-10-19T20:59:23Z")
It is not uncommon to have a referee in American (and I presume English) law. Under certain circumstances a judge will refer a matter or part of a matter out to a non-judge for a decision or for a report. The non-judge to which the matter is referred may be known as a referee (in the federal courts, her or she would be called a special master). Before the bankruptcy law revision in 1978, the officers that we now know as bankruptcy judges had been known as “referees in bankruptcy” for almost a century (because the federal district courts had referred bankruptcy matters to them). As an example, in a matter I am working on, the defendant has alleged that he was not properly served with the summons. The judge in the case has ordered that we have a “traverse” hearing to determine whether he has been served. Instead of holding the traverse himself, the judge has directed that we have the hearing before a referee, who will report his or her findings back to the judge. In any event, I would speculate that the term “referee” in sport springs from the legal meaning of someone to whom a matter is referred for an impartial decision. ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-an-umpire-and-referee/208377/8 "2003-10-20T00:49:24Z")
To further confuse the OP, one of the officials in American football is called “umpire”. He is the guy who lines up with the linebackers and gets run over a lot. He has the primary responsibility for spotting the ball and calling holding penalties on offensive lineman. The head official of a football crew is called “referee” and he wears a white hat. And in college basketball, the head of the officials is called “referee” and the other two are “umpires”. (The NBA dropped this terminology.)