| In stoolball, a milking stool was used as a target, and a hard leather ball stuffed with feathers or hair was thrown at it. |
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| Originally, stoolball was a game played by milkmaids, as early as the 14th century. |
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| Playing stoolball is comparatively cheap, and it doesn't need an immaculate pitch so it can be played almost anywhere. |
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| All that we do know for a fact is that the terms baseball and stoolball were used interchangeably on many occasions. |
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| The earliest known reference to stoolball is in a 1330 poem by William Pagula, who recommended to priests that the game be forbidden within churchyards. |
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| I've found some pictures of stoolball teams from 1949 and 1950 and we'll publish them, come what may, next week. |
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| However, it is generally believed that cricket essentially belongs to the same family of bat-and-ball games as stoolball, rounders and baseball but whether it evolved from any of these, or vice versa, cannot be determined. |
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| These games include stoolball, which dates back to the 11th century, where one player would throw a ball at a target while an opposing player defended the target. |
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| The related game Stoolball is still popular in the Weald, mostly played by ladies teams. |
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