According to legend, Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it during a school football match in 1823, thus creating the "rugby" style of play.

Although the story has become firmly entrenched in the sport's folklore, it is not supported by first-hand evidence, and is discounted by most rugby historians as an origin myth.

His paternal grandfather was from Pontyclun in South Wales, a descendant of the Ellis family of Kiddal Hall, just off the A64 near Potterton, West Riding of Yorkshire.

[10] A picture of him (the only known portrait) appeared in the Illustrated London News in 1854 after he gave a particularly stirring sermon on the subject of the Crimean War.

His grave in le cimetière du vieux château at Menton in Alpes Maritimes was rediscovered by Ross McWhirter in 1958, was renovated by the Riviera Hash House Harriers in 2003 and is now maintained by the French Rugby Federation.

[11] The sole source of the story of Webb Ellis picking up the ball originates with one Matthew Bloxam, a local antiquarian and former pupil of Rugby.

[12] The claim that Webb Ellis invented the game did not surface until four years after his death, and doubts have been raised about the story since 1895 when the Old Rugbeian Society first investigated it.

[13] Among those giving evidence, Thomas Harris and his brother John, who had left Rugby in 1828 and 1832 respectively (i.e. after the alleged Webb Ellis incident) recalled that handling of the ball was strictly forbidden.

[3] Dunning and Sheard suggest that the endorsement of a "reductionist" origin myth by the Rugbeians was an attempt to assert their school's position and authority over a sport that they were losing control of.

[16] Another theory is that Mackie's role may have been disregarded because the committee was seeking to prove Rugby School had invented the game, and thus may have preferred the earliest possible date.