Snooker was traditionally invented in 1875 by Neville Chamberlain.
Chamberlain was serving with the British Army in Jabalpur, India, when he and other officers experimented with a version of pool using additional coloured balls. The resulting game introduced the combination of reds and colours that remains central to modern snooker.
The early game was not yet governed by the detailed rules used today. Its name also developed from military vocabulary: “snooker” referred to an inexperienced cadet, and the word was transferred to the game and eventually to its players.
Snooker later spread through military and sporting networks before becoming established in Britain. The first official world championship was held much later, in 1927, showing that the sport’s origin predates its major organized competitions by more than 50 years.