Traced certainly to the thirteenth century, and conjecturally to the twelfth, the world’s oldest surviving Bowling Green is the Southampton Old Bowling Green, which was first used in 1299. As the game grew in popularity it came under the ban of king and parliament, both fearing it might jeopardise the practice of archery, then so important in battle. Statutes forbidding it and other sports were enacted in the reigns of Edward III, Richard II and other monarchs. Even when, on the invention of gunpowder and firearms, the bow had fallen into disuse as a weapon of war, the prohibition continued. In 1511 Henry VIII confirmed previous enactments against unlawful games, which was not repealed until 1845 – artificers, labourers, apprentices, servants and the like were forbidden to play bowls at any time except Christmas, and then only in their master’s house and presence.