Games that preceded baseball
From SABR Encyclopedia
This list is compiled from the Protoball Glossary; the full glossary contains about 200 games, chiefly baserunning running games involving balls or, sometimes, "cats" (short lengths of wood that could be hit away).
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[edit] The major predecessor games
- Base, or base-ball or bass-ball or baste ball
- Round Ball or Massachusetts Game (eastern New England, upstate New York)
- Philadelphia Town Ball (Pennsylvania)
- Western Town Ball (Cincinnati, St. Louis region, the South)
- Wicket (eastern New England, upstate New York, northern plains states)
- Cricket (in several US regions)
Note: After about 1870, "Town Ball" or sometimes "Old Fashioned Base Ball" was a term used to refer retrospectively broadly to four-base variants, notably town ball and round ball. These terms would generally have been unfamiliar to the original participants.
[edit] Rarer predecessor base-running games
- "American Cricket" – very rare
- Bandy Wicket
- Bat ball – northeast US
- Bat-and-ball – mostly northeast US
- Cat Ball
- Chermany (Chumney, Chuminy) – US south
- Dutch Long
- Goal Ball
- Long Ball
- Long Dutch
- Long Town
- The Old-Cat games – One Old Cat (also one o’cat), Two Old Cat, Three Old Cat, Four Old Cat
- Old Hundred -- US south
- Round Cat – US south
- Round Town – US south
- Rounders – rarely reported in US
- Single-wicket Cricket
- Stoolball – rarely reported in US
- Trap-ball – only sometimes a running game
- Variant names implying the use of plugging: burn ball, patch ball, soak ball, sting ball, and touch-ball
[edit] More distant relatives of base ball
- Non-Team Games: Barn Ball, Move-Up, One Two Three, Scrub, Work-Up
- Games without Bats: Bat-ball (conjectured) Boston Ball, Kickball, Punchball
- Fungo Games: Cat and Dog, Evansville Townball, Hit-the-Bat, Indian Ball, Over-the-Line
[edit] Unrelated ballgames
- Bandy - a game resembling field hockey
- Bull Pen
- Corner Ball
- Fives – like modern (non-team) handball, racquetball
- Hand ball – like modern (non-team) handball, racquetball
- Hurley- like field hockey or golf
- Pall Mall – resembled croquet
- Shinty – resembled field hockey
- Stow Ball – resembled field hockey or golf
[edit] Unrelated game
- Prisoner's Base
[edit] Lost Games
These names refer to games that were played historically, but whose nature has not yet been re-discovered. Some of these games may not have resembled base ball.
- Ball Stand
- Base Dodge Ball
- Batton
- Drive
- GiGi-ball
- Hook-em-Snivy
- Mickey
- Norwegian Ball
- Skip
- Square Ball
- Swede Ball
- Touch-the-Ball
- Tripball
- Up-ball