Aunt
Sally is played by players throwing batons at a wooden skittle known as
a doll and goes back at least as far as the 17th Century. It may have
been introduced by Royalist soldiers during the English Civil war when
Charles set up court in Oxford. It is one of those pub games which
is played only in a very confined locale and hardly at all outside of
this area. In the case of Aunt Sally, the location is Oxfordshire
and despite being restricted only to pubs in and around Oxford it is a
very popular game indeed which is taken very seriously by regulars and
for which there are numerous leagues of some longevity.
Action shot of modern Aunt Sally by kind permission, Arthur Taylor.
There are two 14th century manuscripts which show a game called club kayles (from the French "quilles" or skittles) which depict a skittles game in which one skittle is bigger, differently shaped, and in most cases positioned so as to be the most difficult to knock over. The throwers, in the pictures, are about to launch a long club-like object at the skittles underarm. Many skittles varieties of today still feature this extra large kingpin". Aunt Sally may be a development of skittles whereby this "Kingpin" became the sole interest of the game and the other skittles were dispensed with.
Here is a drawing from the 1911 edition of Whiteley's General Catalogue
(with thanks to Stewart Russ). The author is not sure of the context of
the picture but the doll has been dressed up to look like a woman of exactly
the same as the picture below left.
An alternative theory ascribes Aunt Sally as a development of a game which was essentially a humane version of a barbaric blood sport called "throwing at cocks". In this horrible pastime a cock was tied by one leg to a stake in the ground and the participants would then pay for a turn at throwing a "cok-steles" (small club) at the bird. Whoever killed the bird got to take it home for dinner. If the bird's leg was broken, the sad creature would be supported on sticks until the bitter end. Joseph Strutt noted in 1801 that humane versions of this had been seen as fairground amusements wherein the cock was replaced by a wooden replica and people paid a small sum to attempt to hit it. He thought that this had died out but this theory believes it persisted and became Aunt Sally.
A
third theory concocted, not too cleverly by the author, is that Aunt Sally
is merely an extension of a vulgar misogynist fairground pursuit. As you
can see from the pictures on this page, it is apparent that the doll used
to be dressed up to resemble an old maid and no doubt it was thought to
be an amusing to chuck sticks at the ugly looking Aunt Sally doll. As
can be seen from the examples shown, it seems that often the figure was
painted black - the game was both mysogynist and racist.
At this time, too, the game was played quite differently to the modern game. A number of clay pipes were inserted into the mouth and hung from other parts of the doll and instead of knocking the dolly off the post, the the objective was to break the pipes or knock them off the doll.
The example to the right by kind permission of Richard Ballam shows a late nineteenth century doll on the right that would have been used with the clay pipes. However, the smaller doll on the left is different - it is from an indoor version of the game called "Parlour Aunt Sally" that was commercially manufactured at that time. A closer look reveals that this is not the same game at all - presumably people would not have sticks flying around their drawing room nor would bits of clay pipe all over the floor have been particularly welcome. Hence Parlour Aunt Sally is a rings / quoits game and the target is a single clay pipe in the mouth of the doll...
But why did the old girl lose her clothes? Perhaps the participants couldn't be bothered to dress her up any longer, perhaps their game became too competitive to be trivialised in this way - or perhaps the landlord's wife objected...
Here
is a close up of the doll from "The Boy's Modern Playmate published
in 1890. Pretty she ain't. According to this tome, the game has a brief
"tremendous run of popularity". "For a season, Aunt Sally
was the reigning queen of society, the goddess of fashion, at whose shrine
it behoved all persons who aspired to position in society to come and
bow themselves down." Interestingly, the description of the game
in this book departs radically from the game of today - instead of knocking
the doll off the stick, a number of [presuambly clay] tobacco pipes were
stuck into holes in her nose and ears and the objective was to knock the
pipes out and/or break them.
Regardless, at some point the game started to be played in a few pubs where it later began to be taken more seriously and all socially dubious connotations are now lost in the mists of time. In modern Aunt Sally, the single white stubby skittle, about 6 inches high and 2 and 3/4 inches in diameter, is called "dolly" and the round-ended projectiles, of which there are six, are 18 inches long, 2 inches in diameter and are called "sticks". The doll is positioned on top of a hollow rod (the "iron") driven into the earth so that the top is two and a half feet above the ground and the players throw the sticks at it from behind a line known as the "hockey" which is 10 yards from the iron. Each turn consists of six throws and a point is only counted as long as the stick hits the doll before the iron. Normal league play has two teams each consisting of eight players and three legs or "horses" are played. Each horse consists of each member of each team having one turn so that each team makes 48 throws. It is believed that the record for a horse stands at 40 so it can be seen that hitting the doll is quite tricky.
Where to buy
Masters Traditional Games has Aunt Sally equipment for sale.
Pubs & Leagues
To most people Aunt Sally is only a vague recollection or completely unknown but in Oxfordshire, it is REALLY popular. See here for the large list of Aunt Sally pubs and leagues.
jm at tradgames.org.uk