It is one of the oldest games, played by all ages, both sexes, indoors and outdoors. It dates back to at least the thirteenth century and has been banned twice in England: by Edward III in 1361 and by Henry VIII in 1511, both times for the same reason; it distracted 'Boyers, Fletchers, Stringers and Arrowhead makers' from their trades, and diverted the nation's bowmen from their archery practice. The Scots kept the game alive, and in the 1840's developed a set of rules that has changed little since.

Henry VIII was a keen bowler and ordered everyone wishing to keep a green to pay a fee of £100 - a figure beyond the reach of all but the very rich. He also forbade anyone to 'play at any bowle or bowles in open space outside of his own garden or orchard.'

The most famous game must be the one on Plymouth Ho. History has it that Sir John Hawkins stayed to beat Sir Francis Drake even though the Armada had been sighted, never authenticated but accepted fact by some historians.

The game hasn't changed much over the years as it was during this century that the "bias" was introduced. In the next century however, bowls acquired a reputation of merely being a "Pot house revelry" as it was largely played on greens attached to taverns. In Scotland it was revived to a higher level and never again came so near to oblivion.

In 1971 the English Bowling Association was located at 2 Roseford Road, Cambridge and was part of the International Bowling Board.

We should remember that there are two games of bowls, the rink or level green game and the crown green game with the rinks rather than the objectives differing. The level green variety is more widely played throughout the world. Crown green is played mainly in the north and the midlands on a green whose centre is 6 inches higher than its corners. Crown green, they say, requires a good deal of experience and skill and is mainly a singles game. The level variety is played between sides of 1, 2, 3 or 4 players so of course is a much more sociable game and an ideal sport for new and old and young and old!

It looks a simple game, the object being to place your woods as near as possible to the object ball or "Jack" but with he woods being biased it makes it a game of considerable skill. When bias was introduced it was originally done by weighting with lead this was replaced by "turning" one side of the bowl to be less round than the other. The "turning" refers to when the bowls were "wooden" some of us still have a set of "lignums" (Stan Bacon threatened to burn mine a few years ago because they do turn just a tad more than composite bowls) Composite bowls are now the norm and are no doubt "cast" not "turned". Level green bowls weigh up to 3 1/4 lbs (eat your heart out weights and measures) with crown green bowls being smaller and less biased.

Based on Artefacts found in tombs and from other entries in some of the 'books of the dead' historians believe that bowls originated in ancient Egypt. Roman soldiers played a form of the game in which stone balls were tossed at a pebble. The legions spread the game throughout the roman empire. The French had to be different (perhaps they couldn't create a flat green!) so they invented "petanque or boule" which they play on gravel, sand or any other such surface. They use steel bowls which are thrown as well as rolled at a wooden jack or "cochonnet" A good game when on holiday but not a serious sport for us Brits. In Italy a variant exists called 'bocce'

 

(Sykic don't know where this came from)