The Bewties of the Fute-ball
The Bewties Of The Fute-ball is a brief, anonymous Middle Scots poem of the sixteenth century. It depicts the game of medieval football, as it was played in the same era, as being violent and unruly.
Historical context
Ball games played between opposing teams were widespread in pre-modern Europe. Many localities are known to have had a variety including the Calcio of Florence and La Soule of northern FranceIn Scotland, football games were common enough for the Scottish Parliament to attempt to outlaw them on several occasions. An act of 1457, under James II, is typical. The act was principally intended to encourage archery practice but decreed that football, and also golf, should be simultaneously discouraged.
or in translation,
Despite these bans, in 16th-century Perth apprentices progressing to become master craftsmen traditionally had to pay for a banquet and hold a football match. Several ball games which appear to predate the modern era exist in modern Scotland. The Kirkwall Ba Game is an example.
The text
The Bewties Of The Fute-ball is preserved only in the Maitland Folio Manuscript of the latter sixteenth century. It consists of two pairs of rhyming couplets and it is attributed to no author.In Modern Scots:
The poem might be translated into modern English as,
It is not clear whether the poem is genuinely criticising the game for its roughness or praising it ironically for the same reason.