Lost: Marbles, reward if found...

I have been putting off this post for some time, and I will tell you for why. The trouble with a post on marbles is the same as that with one on balls, playing cards, or the opposite sex; these are things we play games with, rather than games in and of themselves.

So, for my first ever attempt at making a medieval game I thought I'd be as simple as possible. And what could be more simple than a sphere! Yeah, okay, I know, I know.

Period Pieces.

According to posterity* marbles are as old as the hills, literally. Marbles games have been played since vaguely round stones could be found in streams or made from clay. They have been played for thousands of years with examples being found on archaeological sites across the ancient world, from t'Egypt to Pakistan.

So marbles are old then?

Right for the medieval period, certainly. At this time the majority of marbles available to a peasant like me would be of clay; agates did exist but were expensive and glass not happening until the Renaissance.

The game of Three Holes, played
here with four holes. Bloody Flems
confusing matters.

So what of playing marbles? Well, we can't be sure exactly what they games they played with marbles but it is almost certain there would have been more than one. The Bruegel painting seems to show a game which has been called Three Holes, which is a simple target game with a number of holes, although I forget now how many.

But in order to draw in the parents who probably played marbles themselves I tend to show the most common "Game of Marbles", when demonstrating.

How to play.

You have two types of marbles, mibs (the little ones) and shooters  (the big ones). The rules are really simple you draw a circle on the ground or in the dirt (I make the circle smaller in this instance), pour in the mibs (retrieving any that might fall out) then attempt to knock them out of the circle with the shooters. How you hold/throw/flick the shooter depends on you, although it's best to come to some agreement among the players. Players score one point for each marble knocked out, or double points for knocking out more than one in a single shot. There, that wasn't to hard now was it. 

Of course the tendency among school boys in years past was rather than taking score was to 'play for keeps'. Which I believe is where we get the expression.

 Making Medieval Marbles

So I figured that the simplest solution was to employ some air drying clay roll it into balls of roughly even size, lay them out to dry, and Bob's your mother's brother. It sounds so simple doesn't it! And yet how utterly and buttock clenchingly frustrating is it to try and roll a perfect sphere, especially when you keep flinging them at the wall. In the end you either have to buy them in, or compromise. 

Things to remeber for next time include;

• Wet the clay before use to meld the clay and give an even surface.
• Clay marbles are much lighter than glass ones, so have less momentum to knock each other out of the circle which makes for a slower game.
• Don't forget to make a few shooters as well as the mibs.

 *An interesting word which I believe shares a root with posterior, which tells you everything you need to know.