Got Medieval specializes
in European Medieval history, with a recurring emphasis on the visual
arts of the time and the marginalia inscribed on illuminated
manuscripts. The image shown above, "found in
the margins of the calendar that was originally part of the Ghistelles
Hours, a
14th-century Flemish book of hours..." Herewith a brief summary:
Though there's no base in sight, various
historians of sport have identified this game as a version of "stool
ball" or "stump ball", which was baseball played with only one base,
where the object was for the pitcher to hit a stump or a stool or
other handy protrusion with the ball while the batter protected it by
batting away the pitcher's balls...
We have no clue how the scoring might have worked, but apparently the game was co-ed and the sort of thing you'd play at an Easter festival.
For further discussion and a picture of
medieval monkeys playing baseball
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