Jeu de mail

Jeu de mail, in Anglo-Saxon literature called ‘pall mall’, was a one target game, played with a wooden club with a cylindrical wooden head and a spherical wooden ball.

The game was originally played in the South of France and it is said that the game came into France from Italy around the 15th century.The essence of the game was to reach a target in the fewest number of strokes. It was an individual game, not a team game. In the South of France the game was played ‘à la chicane’, in the fosses, on the ramparts and on the sandy tracks around the towns. The game attracted the interest of kings and nobles, who played the game on specially laid out narrow playing alleys (boulevards) of up to a thousand meters in length in many French towns, soon followed by the main towns of Western Europe and of Britain. The ‘noble’ game ceased to be played by the end of the 18th century. The game à la chicane continued to be played in the South of France until 1939, when the last mail player in Montpellier stowed away his mail equipment in the attic of his house.

Publication	Author	Published in
Jeu de mail à Orange	Geert & Sara Nijs	2017 March
Mail, a long and a short game	Geert & Sara Nijs	2015 August From 'Games for Kins & Commoners', Part III, chapter 'Long and short games'
Jeu de mail in Germany	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter "Spreading (s)wings"
Maliën in the Netherlands - Introduction 01	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter "Maliën in the Netherlands'
Maliën in the Netherlands - Introduction 02	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter "Maliën in the Netherlands'
Maliën in the Netherlands - The Maliebaan of The Hague	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter 'Maliën in the Netherlands'
Maliën in the Netherlands - The Maliebaan of Utrecht	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter 'Maliën in the Netherlands'
Maliën in the Netherlands - The Maliebaan of Leiden	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter 'Maliën in the Netherlands'
Maliën in the Netherlands - The Maliebaan of Amsterdam	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter 'Maliën in the Netherlands'
Maliën in the Netherlands - Private mail courses	Geert & Sara Nijs	2014 July From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' Part II, chapter 'Maliën in the Netherlands'
From Munro bagging to Mail bagging A la recherche des anciens courts de jeu du mail	Geert & Sara Nijs	2013 October
Jeu de mail in Switzerland	Geert & Sara Nijs	2013 From 'Games for Kings & Commoners', Part II, to be issued in 2014 (Les Editions Choulla et Clava)
La Bernarde : boule de mail pour s'assurer la victoire ?		2012 La France pittoresque, N° 41
Knocking wooden balls around	Geert & Sara Nijs	2011 September From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' chapter 'Knocking wooden balls around'
The Royal and Ancient Game of Mail	Geert & Sara Nijs	2011 September From 'Games for Kings & Commoners' chapter 'Kings took to the links'
Mail too frivolous for women?	Geert & Sara Nijs	2011 September From 'Games for Kings & Commoners', chapter 'Clearly unsuitable for women'
Le Noble Jeu de Mail de la ville de Montpellier	Philippe Estang	2009 February www.apgf.fr
Jeu de Mail Part 2	Henri Jakubowicz	2003 March Through The Green (Magazine of the British Golf Collectors Society)
Jeu de Mail Part 1	Henri Jakubowicz	2002 December Through The Green (Magazine of the British Golf Collectors Society)
The Sister of Golf	Andrew Lang	1909 Octobre Article in Blackwood’s Magazine Reprint in Golf Illustrated, Vol. 4, Number 4, January 1916
Histoire du jeu de mail et du billard	L.E. Fournier	1889 Histoire des jouets et des jeux d'enfant © Le Livre d'histoire-Lorisse Paris 2002