ABSTRACT
The terminology used by shooters can be traced back to the days of shooting live birds. A target is called a bird, a hit is a kill, and the machines that propel the targets are still called traps.
See also Pigeon Shooting
John Martin
A skittles-type game that was played at least until the seventeenth century and which appears to have been very similar to ninepins. Also referred to as ‘cloishe’, ‘claishe’ and ‘closhe’, little is known about it other than that it was repeatedly banned by government order from 1477. Closh may have been an alternative name for kayles. It was sufficiently popular in the fifteenth century to have grounds specifically created for its playing, which were known as closh-banes. In the game played in Holland from the sixteenth century, the ball had to be driven through a hoop using a mallet shaped like a spade or chisel.
