Editor's Note:  David Block, a SABR member since 1997, is author of the soon-to-be-released Baseball Before We Knew It:  A Search for the Roots of the Game published by University of Nebraska Press.  This article first appeared in 2001 as a SABR Forums posting on the members-only portion of this website. 

Today’s Trivia Quiz:

When, where and by whom were the first rules of baseball published?

a. 1845 in New York by Alexander Cartwright (or Doc Adams)
b. 1839 in Cooperstown by Abner Doubleday
c. 1834 in Boston by Robin Carver
d. 1828 in London by William Clarke
e. none of the above

The answer? Would you be surprised to learn that the earliest printed rules for baseball predate all of the above answers by more than 30 years? Would you believe 1796? Even more surprising is the location. Not in the infant United States where George Washington was delivering his farewell address. Not even in England which was watching nervously as Napoleon's army moved against Austria and Italy. How about that heartland of baseball, the tiny hamlet of Schnepfenthal in the Duchy of Gotha? It’s true. Many years before the first rules of baseball appeared in English, German youth, parents and educators were reading about “das englische Base-ball.”

The source of these rules is a wonderfully detailed book on games and sports by the German physical education pioneer Johann Christoph Friedrich Guts Muths. To be sure, the early brand of baseball described by Guts Muths is somewhat primitive, and only partly resembles the modern game. However, his surprisingly detailed seven page description presents a vivid and previously unknown picture of baseball at an early evolutionary moment.

Guts Muths entitled the game “Ball mit Freystäten (oder das englische Base-ball),” which literally translates to “ball with free station, or English base-ball.” Even though the book was intended for a German audience, there is no indication that the game was actually played in Germany. However, the fact that Guts Muths, working from a small town in central Germany, was familiar enough with baseball to include it in his book suggests that the game was already well established in England.

The version of baseball described by Guts Muths contains some features that have changed considerably over the years. For example, the bat is only two feet long and oddly shaped, the number of bases varies with the number of players, and the batting team is entitled to only one out before the side is retired. Nevertheless, at its core, das englische Base-ball is very familiar. A pitcher serves to a batter who has three attempts to put the ball in play. Once striking the ball, the batter runs counterclockwise from base to base as far as possible without being put out. His objective is to complete a circuit of the bases and return to home. Outs are recorded by catching the ball, touching the runner with the ball, or throwing to a base.

Dimensions and scale of das englische Base-ball were smaller than in today’s game. The pitcher stood only five or six steps from the batter and lobbed the ball in an arc. The bases were 10 to 15 paces apart, and the short bat had a four inch flat face at the hitting end. Home base was an area rather than a specific spot, and apparently all players from the hitting team gathered there, not just the individual who was batting.

However, as strange as they seem, the features described by Guts Muths are generally consistent with the few other known descriptions of early baseball. These, of course, all preceded the introduction of the “modern” Knickerbocker rules in 1845, and can be summarized as follows:

--The description of La balle empoisonée (poisoned ball) which first appeared in the French book Les Jeux des Jeunes Garçons about 1815. This variety of early baseball also had the entire batting team standing at home plate, and featured “one out, all out.” Unlike das englische Base-ball, the number of bases was limited to four. Baserunners could be retired by being struck with the ball (the poisoned ball). This feature, also known as “soaking,” was common to all versions of early baseball prior to 1845.

--Portrayal of the game rounders in William Clarke’s The Boy’s Own Book, second London edition, 1828. This was the first description of a baseball-like game to appear in English. It introduced the diamond shaped layout of the four bases. Baserunners, however, ran in a clockwise direction. Similar to das englische Base-ball, the pitcher stood close to the batter and lobbed the ball. A team batted until all its players made out.

--Description of “base or goal ball” published in Boston by Robin Carver in The Book of Sports, 1834. These rules were cloned from Clarke’s depiction of rounders. After being re-edited, this description appeared again the following year in the children’s chapbook The Boy’s Book of Sports, under the heading “base-ball,” with the notable change that baserunners ran counterclockwise. Both books featured a woodcut illustration of children playing ball on the Boston Common. The image shows a tiny bat similar in length to the one described in das englische Base-ball.

--Purported observation of Native Americans playing a game similar to baseball which appeared in the fictional work Female Robinson Crusoe published in New York in 1837. This detailed account is the earliest portrayal of a bat and ball baserunning game that is of uniquely American origin.

Taken together, these various descriptions reveal early baseball as a work in progress. From the appearance of Guts Muths’ rules in 1796 to the Knickerbocker rules in the 1840’s, the game went through a process of refinement and standardization. Some colorful features were dropped altogether. For example, one quirky rule in both das englische Base-ball and La balle empoisonée allowed the batting team, after making out, to retain their at bats. All they had to do was run onto the field, grab the ball, and then either tag or throw the ball at one of the fielders before the team was able to get off the playing field. Of course, the defenders, if the victim of this maneuver, then had the opportunity to return the favor to the batting team before they made it back to the home plate area, and so on. Guts Muths clearly enjoyed this feature of baseball. He said: “In this way a fun, short-lived fight ensues, and the team that wins at the end is the one that has the last throw. This is the reason why, when one catches the ball, one must throw it backwards, and why when one burns or touches a runner for an out, the ball must be thrown such that no one from the opposing team can grab it and thus throw it again.”

But while this feature has been long forgotten, other aspects of das Englische base-ball are curiously familiar. For example, consider this passage from the rules regarding baserunning (keeping in mind that the number of bases often exceeded four): “When several hitters have already hit and run, then several bases are occupied. Let us assume that this is the case with bases 3 and 4. Thus it sometimes happens that when a new hit occurs, the person on 3 runs further, whereas the person on 4 stands still (either due to inattentiveness or because the serving team is too near to him with the ball) the result of which is that two people are standing on base 4. This once again calls for the order of the game: there can only be one person at one base at any time. If, in this case, the person at base 4 does not quickly run to base 5, or if the recently arrived runner does not return to base 3, then the best positioned member of the serving team in possession of the ball can run toward them and either touch one of the individuals or burn one of them in the manner described above, in which case the at bat is lost.”

The title of the book containing das englische Base-ball is a mouthful in any language: Spiele zur Uebung und Erholung des Korpers und Geistes fur die Jugend, ihre Erzieher und alle Freunde Unschuldiger Jugendfreuden. This roughly translates as: Games for the Exercise and Recreation of Body and Spirit for the Youth and His Educator and All Friends of Innocent Joys of Youth.

The 492 page book also includes coverage of many other ball games and youth activities, including a lengthy description of das Deutches ballspiele or “the German ball game,” a cousin of baseball, also known as ballstock. The German ball game was popular in the late 18th century, and while it continued to be played through the mid-1800’s, it is now apparently extinct. Guts Muths dwelt on the relative merits of das englische Base-ball and the German ball game. He said English baseball “is smaller in scale and requires less strength in hitting, running, etc. At the same time, it demands an equal amount, if not more, attentiveness, and is much more bound by numerous small rules.” He observed, “The German ball game will never be able to fully repress English base-ball, as pleasant as ours may be.” Anybody keeping statistics on understatements?

Guts Muths went so far as to devote a separate short chapter to promote his ideas for an improved hybrid game that would “unite both forms.” He said it would be based upon the superior rules of English baseball, but would adapt the longer, stronger bat of the German ball game so that the ball could be hit with greater power. He also recommended, in addition to a home base, a fixed layout of four bases arranged in a square pattern. (In fact, his proposal is similar to later rounders and town ball configurations.) He believed these improvements would make the game more appealing to German players.

Baseball, Rounders and Robert W. Henderson

While uncertainties remain about baseball’s complex evolution, the discovery of Guts Muths’ rules helps untangle one major misconception. Many of the game’s historians, from Henry Chadwick to the present day, have postulated that baseball descended from the old English game of rounders. Chadwick, who was born in 1824 in the town of Exeter in western England, recalled playing rounders as a child. Because baseball reminded him of his childhood pastime, he naturally concluded that rounders was the ancestor of the American game. Beginning in 1860, Chadwick included his baseball-from-rounders theory in virtually every one of the innumerable writings on baseball he produced over the next 40 years.

Of course, it was this “un-American” theory that provoked Albert Spalding into convening the Mills Commission, which ultimately saddled us with the Doubleday myth. Then in 1939, New York librarian and pioneer baseball researcher Robert W. Henderson, in his essay “Baseball and Rounders,” disproved the Doubleday fiction. Using sources such as the 1828 rules for rounders that appeared in The Boy’s Own Book, he demonstrated conclusively that baseball derived from that particular old English game. Or did he? While most baseball historians since Henderson have repeated the baseball-from-rounders theory, few have conducted fresh research on the subject.

Let’s take a closer look at what Henderson actually uncovered. In his “Summary: How Baseball Developed” he said research showed that a children’s “bat-and-ball base-circulating game” called base-ball emerged in England in the early 18th century. “It continued to be played, and be called base-ball until well after 1800.” He said that the game was also introduced in America “at least as early as 1762, growing in popularity until well after 1800, when it was played, and called base-ball, in many parts of the country.” Then he described some name changes. In England in the early 19th century, Henderson said similar games were played in different localities, with the name base-ball changed to feeder in some places and rounders in others. In the United States after 1800, he said “as primitive baseball developed in different localities, the name base-ball survived, but forms of the game were known as round-ball and town-ball.”

Given this analysis, It is perplexing that in his conclusion to “Baseball and Rounders”, Henderson made a statement that has since sent baseball history amiss. He said: “baseball as played in America today is the descendant, remotely, of the older English game of base-ball, and directly of the English game of rounders.”

What did Henderson mean to convey by this statement? All his supporting arguments point to a conclusion that modern baseball descended from early baseball, with rounders being one of several regional names that emerged at a midpoint in the game’s development. This is supported by a passage from Henderson’s landmark study of ball sports, Ball, Bat and Bishop, published in 1947. In discussing the rules for “rounders” that appeared in the original English edition of The Boy’s Own Book, he said: “The fact that the name ‘rounders’ was selected, instead of the earlier name ‘base-ball’ indicates that the former name was in more general use about the year 1829.” Henderson’s only point in saying that baseball developed “via the rounders route” was to trace the brief five years when the published rules were labeled “rounders” before being renamed “base-ball.” Taking everything into account, it seems improbable that Henderson would take much joy in having his research reduced to the phrase “baseball descended from rounders”. This simplification has renewed and nourished the historical fallacy that rounders was a separate older game which preceded baseball, and gave rise to baseball.

Perhaps the discovery of the 1796 Guts Muths book can help set the record straight. Now it can be shown that a set of kindred rules for a game called “base-ball” preceded the well known 1828 rules for rounders, which have long propped up the baseball-from-rounders hypothesis. Also instructive is the fact that the name “rounders” cannot be found in the historical record prior to the year 1828, whereas the word “base-ball” shows up at least five times in 18th century writings. Within the pantheon of baseball mythology, Abner Doubleday may reign supreme. Yet, in terms of longevity, the rounders ancestry myth is a formidible challenger.

Early Baseball, the Last Frontier

While the discovery of baseball rules in the 18th Century is surprising, an even greater surprise is the fact that they had not been unearthed earlier. Guts Muths’ book, while not exactly commonplace, is not exceedingly rare. Several copies have been located in American libraries and more can be found in Europe. Perhaps the common assumption that baseball’s ancestry resided exclusively within English and American folklore has deflected researchers from examining books in other languages.

One notable exception to this was Harold Peterson, author of The Man Who Invented Baseball, a 1973 book on the life of Alexander Cartwright. Peterson delved into numerous European and African predecessors of baseball, and, remarkably, even devoted several pages to a discussion of Guts Muths’ book. However, while he talked about the German ball game and its significance to the origins of baseball, he never mentioned Guts Muths’ specific description of a game called base-ball! Perhaps Peterson never studied the German book first hand and was using material he had received from another source. We may never know the actual explanation because Mr. Peterson has, unfortunately, passed away.

The uncovering of 1796 rules for das englische Base-ball is at least the second notable revelation about baseball’s early history to be reported in the past year. In a front page story on July 1, 2001, The New York Times described the amazing discovery by researcher George Thompson Jr. that an organized form of baseball was being played by young men in Manhattan in the year 1823. Thompson came across this information buried in an obscure New York newspaper from 1823, and first reported the discovery in SABR’s research journal “The National Pastime.” His find advances by more than 20 years the earliest known record of adults playing organized baseball.

In a sport as heavily studied and researched as baseball, discoveries like Thompson’s and the Guts Muths’ book reveal an interesting phenomenon: We really don’t know that much about the game’s early history. The late 18th and early 19th centuries weren’t that long ago. Historical research of that era for other fields of endeavor is fairly mature. Could baseball’s history still be suffering from the legacy of the Doubleday myth? Baseball’s start date was frozen at 1839 for nearly a half century. Is it possible that the game’s archeologists still haven’t made up for the lost time?

Whatever the reason, these recent discoveries show that the terrain of baseball’s early years is still prime for study and exploration. Few areas of baseball research are so fertile.