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HUMOUR

THE OLDEST GAME ON EARTH

By James Clarke

olf is an exceptionally ancient game. “Hey this is fun,” said Og. “But how about Certainly the Scots turned the game
It goes back well before Gary Player. a game in which teams kick a big leather around by using softer balls made of skin
GIn fact it goes back to the time of ball. We could call it soccer?” and twine and aiming for holes somewhat
the knuckle-dragging man-apes. smaller than warthog burrows. They also
“It’ll never catch on,” said Ug. turned the name around – ‘flog’ was spelt
Three or four million years ago our backwards to become ‘golf’. It’s amazing
ancestors were forced out of Africa’s And so a kind of game was born. It was, at how few people know this.
receding forests and on to the plains. To first, no more than ‘hunt-the-stone’ and it
see over the top of the grass they were sometimes entailed flattening the veld by From here on the history of the game
compelled to stand upright - the first step flogging the eye-level grass using these is more accurately documented.
towards being able to play golf. funny sticks. The game became known as Encyclopaedia Britannica says that by the
‘flog’. mid-1400s James II decreed that “Golfe be
Their only weapon in this new landscape utterly cried down” because it was rivalling
which, as one can imagine, was picked If, of course, a stone went down a hole, archery as an outdoor pastime and archery
over by some pretty mean creatures, was then quite often, there it had to stay. The was necessary for the defence of the realm.
a club. A club: the second step had been floggers soon realised they needed lots Some say the game originated in Holland
achieved. of little white stones. This now became
the job of the women because, after all, or Belgium and grew out of the game of
One day a man-ape, Ug Blainkenthorpe collecting little white stones was, strictly- chole. Chole was a cross-country game in
(not his real name) picked up a stick speaking, ‘gathering’ and, therefore, in which opposing sides set off to hit the ball
intending to use it as a club for hitting this hunter-gatherer society it fell into the across many kilometres to a target such as
small mammals and people he didn’t like. women’s department. a church door. After one side had played
However, it was too whippy for hunting. three strokes the other side had the right
But he liked the stick and he pondered One day Og said to Ug, “Maybe it will be to hit their opponents’ ball into the nearest
over it for some time before an idea struck more fun if we deliberately aim for holes hazard - even over a cliff.
him. to see who can sink their stone in the least This, today, could result in temper
number of strokes.” tantrums.
He used it to hit small, round, white stones.
He watched in fascination as the stones Flog, when all is considered, has not It might be significant that the Scots
flew off into the distance. improved much beyond this although bought their balls from Holland until
cutting the grass was a useful step. James II curbed the trade because ‘no
Then he and his friend, Og Willisden, (as small quantitie’ of gold and silver was
an historian I must warn some authorities Sports historians - ignorant of the being spent on their purchase.
say his name was spelt Willisdon), spent foregoing - generally believe that it was
many hours hunting for these beautiful the Scots who invented the game around I gave up golf many years ago after the
pebbles and, being hunters, they enjoyed the 1300s. That is what is written in some primeval thrill of hunting for balls grew
this immensely. history books. thin.

40 INTRA MUROS SEPTEMBER 2020