Shinty

Glossary of Games

Curated by Larry McCray and Jeffrey Kittel
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Game	Shinty
Game Family	Hook-em-snivy Hook-em-snivy
Location
Regions	Britain, US
Eras	1700s, 1800s
Invented	No
Tags
Description	It appears that shinty was a bat-and-ball game known in Britain and Ireland and America before 1800 (Strutt, 1903 reprinting, page 92.).  Not usually reported as a base-running game, it may have resembled what we now call field hockey.  As of 2022, Protoball.org has not collected much information on the history this game.  It appears to be similar or identical with the game known as hurling . Other names we know of are listed at bandy, [[hunyou-hinyou]], and Iceland's [[knattleikar]]. Today's digital searches sometimes reveal shinty being played in the United States long ago. In August 2022, Protoball's legendary Bruce Allardice reports:  "I found a reference to games of shinty (sort of a field hockey-type game) played at the Elysian Fields in 1839 (NY Herald, Sept. 10, 1839) as part of the Highland games" (Email of 8/12/2022).
Sources
Source Image	[[Image:|left|thumb]]
Comment	Shinty was played in the US prewar. Cf. the Lancaster (PA) Daily Evening Express, Feb. 2, 1860; Boston Evening Transcript, Oct. 26, 1857; New York Herald, Sept. 10, 1839 (shinty played in the Scottish games, at the Elysian Fields in Hoboken). In 1589 the playing of golf, carrick, and shinty, was forbidden in the Blackfriars Yards, Glasgow, 'Sunday or week-day.' (Browning's History of Golf) As was hurling. A Hurling Club was established in Buffalo in 1860. See the Buffalo Courier, June 11, 1860. Also Brooklyn. See the ad for the new Brooklyn Hurling Club, in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Dec. 31, 1860. Also in Philadelphia by 1862. See Scharf, "Philadelphia" p. 801. Chronologies 1772.1 points out that Irish soldiers played Hurling in NYC in 1772, and that Hurling clubs were formed in San Francisco in 1853 and NYC in 1857. It appears the two games were similar, Shinty being the Scots version and Hurling the Irish. [ba]   Edit with form to add a comment
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