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History of Darts
There seems to have been a weapon called a dart in existence for many hundreds
of years as various mostly obscure literary references to the term affirm. However,
the existence of a dart is not the same as the existence of the Game of Darts.
The first clear references to any game like darts first appear as a nineteenth
century parlour game. The first such game was called Puff and Dart which used
a blowpipe to fire a dart at the target. It is said that in 1844, during a game
of Puff and Dart at a London pub, a player made the unfortunate mistake of sucking
rather than blowing. The dart disappeared into his digestive system whereupon
the poor chap died a few days later. The other game was Dart and Target which
is similar but without the blow-pipe i.e. the darts are thrown. Best guess for
date of appearance of this is late 1870s.
Early forms of Darts started to grown in popularity in the 19th Century but
it didn't become a serious pub game until the 20th century when it was still
known as Dart and Target according to 'Lawful Games on Licensed Premises', 1904.
Dart and Target was played on a board of numbered coloured circles, on which
doubles and trebles did not feature, the highest score being the bullseye and
lowest at the edge. Brewers started to organise leagues from around 1925. .
Like other games, Darts suffered from laws prohibiting it in places such as
Liverpool and Glasgow.
Although the standard or trebles or "London" board pictured
is the primary darts board in use today, many different designs have existed
over the years and non-London variants are still around. Still known to
be used are the Yorkshire board, the Lancashire or Manchester board, the Staffordshire
Board and East End Darts is also still popular being played on a boards with
segments scoring multiples of five. The London board's segmented numbering
scheme is inherited from the old Yorkshire, Burton, Irish and Lincoln boards
which have a similar arrangement. The only picture that exists of
any dartboard prior to 1920 is a picture of the weird-looking Grimsby board
from around 1890.
Today, Darts is played by 6 million people regularly and features
on Satellite TV. Visit The Online Guide to Traditional Games to find out more
about the history of Darts,
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