Devil among the tailors

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Devil among the tailors is a pub game which is a form of table skittles.

The game involves 9 small skittles arranged in a 3 x 3 square, usually within a shallow open-topped wooden box sitting on a table-top. The wooden ball (about the size of a golf ball) hangs from a string or chain attached to the top of a vertical wooden post rising from one corner of the box. The aim of the game is to knock down the skittles by swinging the ball in an arc round the post (rather than aiming directly at the skittles).

[edit] Name Origins

On 15th August 1805 a play called The Tailors: A Tragedy for Warm Weather, starring William Dowton, was presented at the theatre, then known as The Little Theatre in the Hay. The London tailors took exception to this satire on their craft, and thousands rioted, both inside and outside the theatre. The special constables were helpless against the overwhelming odds, so a troop of Life Guards was called. Sixteen prisoners were taken and the rest dispersed. The Life Guards did their job so effectively that it was likened to a skittle ball ploughing through the skittles. Thereafter, the game of Table Skittles (or Bar Skittles) was often referred to as‘Devil Amongst the Tailors’ (or Devil Among the Tailors).^{[citation needed]}

In the picturesque name, the 'devil' refers to the ball and the 'tailors' are the skittles.