WHAT IS BOWLING?

Even if you're not interested in playing the game and would just as soon skip Ravielli's tips and his explanations of rules and scoring, you'll find his diverting history worth the few minutes it takes to get through. Starting with the Stone Age when bowling wasn't a game but more likely a form of target practice, Ravielli reports that Bocci, still popular today, was a favorite of Caesar's troops, that indoor bowling using pins was developed around 300 A.D. in German monasteries where the kegels represented the devil, and that it became just one of the Christian practices Martin Luther rook a hand in reforming. Tenpins began in New York City in the 1800's when ninepins, then associated with gambling and practiced in saloon basements, became illegal, And there are now about 30 million American bowlers--a substantial audience.