Boules
range of games in which the objective is to throw balls close as possible to a small target
Boules (, French pronunciation: [bul]), or jeu de boules, is a collective name for a wide range of games similar to bowls and bocce in which the objective is to throw or roll heavy balls as closely as possible to a small target ball, called the jack. 'Boules' itself is a French loanword that usually refers to the game especially played in France.
Boules-type games are traditional and popular in many European countries and are also popular in some former French colonies in Africa and Asia. Boules games are often played in open spaces (town squares and parks) in villages and towns. Dedicated playing areas for boules-type games are typically large, level, rectangular courts made of flattened earth, gravel, or crushed stone, enclosed in wooden rails or back boards. To win, a team must reach 15 points, with a few exceptions.
Boules games in history
As early as the 6th century BC the ancient Greeks are recorded to have played a game of tossing coins, then flat stones, and later stone balls, called spheristics, trying to have them go as far as possible. The ancient Romans modified the game by adding a target that had to be approached as closely as possible. This Roman variation was brought to Provence by Roman soldiers and sailors. A Roman sepulchre (now in the Campana Collection in the Louvre) shows children playing this game, stooping down to measure the points.
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This entry incorporates text from “Boules” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.