We’ve become part-time groupies for our local village bowls team. To the uninitiated, bowls is a traditional sport beloved of the gray herd in which the objective is to roll weighted balls along a green so that they stop close to a smaller ball at the other end – closest wins. A variant of French boules, the game has ancient roots. That’s all I know.
Following a period of death and decline, a newly invigorated Chedgrave Bowls Club has attracted fresh and younger blood and is on a winning streak, starting with the Marie Curie Cup last autumn. While we don’t really have the first clue what’s going on, it’s a pleasant way to while away a warm summer’s day with a couple of G&Ts – ice and a slice. The fact that the bowling green is adjacent to our local tavern is a bonus.
Can you spot us?
The last time we were on groupie duty, it was suggested we might resurrect the old East Anglian pub sport of dwile flonking. This involves two teams of twelve players, each taking a turn to girt (dance) around the other while attempting to avoid a beer-soaked dwile (cloth) flonked (flung) by the non-girting team.
Here are the rules (according to Wikipedia):
A ‘dull witted person’ is chosen as the ‘jobanowl’ (referee), and the two teams decide who flonks first by tossing a sugar beet. The game begins when the jobanowl shouts, “Here y’go, t’gither” (together).
The non-flonking team joins hands and girts in a circle around a member of the flonking team. The flonker dips his dwile-tipped ‘driveller’ (a pole 2–3 ft long and made from hazel or yew) into a bucket of beer, then spins around in the opposite direction to the girters and flonks his dwile at them.
If the dwile misses completely it is known as a ‘swadge’. If this happens, the flonker must drink the contents of an ale-filled chamber pot (or gazunder as in ‘goes-under’ the bed) before the wet dwile has passed from hand to hand along the line of now non-girting girters chanting the ceremonial mantra of “pot, pot, pot!”.
A full game comprises two ‘snurds’, each snurd being one team taking a turn at girting. The jobanowl adds interest and difficulty to the game by randomly switching the direction of rotation and will levy drinking penalties on any player found not taking the game seriously enough.
Apparently, by the end of play, everyone’s too pissed to give a toss. If it’s not illegal, it ought to be. ‘Normal for Norfolk’ as the saying goes.
Many thanks to Gary Shilling, villager extraordinaire, for the inspiration for this post.
