Table top skittles are a smaller version of the larger traditional pub game of Alley Skittles or Nine Pins, the Old English forerunner to ten pin bowling. As Alley skittles takes up a large amount of valuable floor space in a pub, a smaller bar game version was required. The most famous of all traditional table-top skittles games is the bar game known as Bar Skittles or Table Skittles or Indoor Skittles. These distinctive pub games appeared in the 1700s and were cleverly miniaturised so that no long bowling alley was required at all, the nine pins standing on a square table were knocked down by a ball which was swung around a pole. Very little room was required for this pub game and it soon became very popular and one of the most successful of all traditional pub games.
Sad to say, but it’s true. The old traditional pub games are dying out. When did you last see anyone playing shove ha’penny across the bar? Or playing cribbage in the corner, their pints of foamy stouts set before them like large fluffy sheep? Or playing skittles… hang on.
The revival of bar skittles in the pubs & bars of this great land may not have caught on just yet, but there are tentative stirrings. Due in part to products such as this, bar skittles is becoming a popular bar game again!
This set features a deluxe mahogany game tray lined with a green baize, and has a lengthy wooden pole with an attached ball and chain ready to knock down the 9 skittles! Included on the game tray is a scoring board with four pins provided so you can keep tally of how many frames you are winning!
Dimensions:
H (game tray) 50mm
H (total with pole) 705mm
L 600mm
W 430mm
