1846.14

English Crew Teaches Rounders to Baltic Islanders

Salience	Noteworthy
Tags	Pre-modern RulesPre-modern Rules
Location
City/State/Country:	Estonia
Modern Address
Game	XenoballXenoball
Immediacy of Report	Retrospective
Age of Players	AdultAdult
Holiday
Notables
Text	"In 1846 a three-master . . . from London stranded on the island. . . . The captain spent the winter with the local minister, and the sailors with the peasants. According to information given by a man named Matts Bisa, the visitors taught the men of Runö a new batting game. As the cry "runders" shows, his game was the English rounders, a predecessor of baseball. It was made part of the old cult game." This game was conserved on the island, at least until 1949.
Sources	Erwin Mehl, "A Batting Game on the Island of Runö," Western Folklore vol 8, number 3, (1949?), page 268.
Warning
Comment	Ruhnu Island (formerly cited as "Runo") is a small island off the northern coast of Estonia. Its current population about 100 souls. It was formerly occupied by Swedes. Edit with form to add a comment
Query	Edit with form to add a query
Source Image	[[Image:\|left\|thumb]]
External Number
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Has Supplemental Text

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