History
There is solid evidence that curling was a sport in both Scotland and the Low Countries during the 16th century.
The oldest known curling stone, found in Scotland, bears the date 1511, and a 1560 work by the Flemish painter, Pieter Breughel, shows a busy Dutch curling scene, complete with brooms.
The game was played on frozen marshes in Scotland, using "channel stones" that had been worn smooth by the action of water, while the Dutch curled on the same frozen canals where ice skating flourished.
As with golf, the question of where curling was "invented" will probably never be answered, but the Scots certainly have to be credited both with developing the modern version of the sport and with promoting the game in America.
Scottish immigrants organized the Royal Montreal Curling Club in 1807 and the Orchard Lake, Michigan, Club in 1832. The Grand Caledonian Curling Club (later the Royal Caledonian Curling Club) was founded in 1838 at Edinburgh to become Scotland's national governing body and to standardize rules for international play.
A branch of the Royal Caledonian was established in Canada in 1852 and the Grand National Curling Club of America, also an affiliate of the Royal Caledonian, was founded in 1867.
However, curling was primarily a local and regional sport until 1927, when the first Canadian national championship was held. A tremendous growth in the sport after World War II led to the founding of the U. S. Women's Curling Association in 1947, the first U. S. national championships in 1957, and the organization of the U. S. Curling Association, a federation of 125 clubs, in 1958.
The first world championship tournament was held in 1958. Canadian teams have dominated the event, which is now conducted by the International Curling Federation (ICF), founded in 1966 and based in Edinburgh.
There are more than 30 nations in the ICF, which estimates that about 2 million people worldwide regularly participate in curling.
Curling has been a demonstration or exhibition sport at several Olympics. It became a full-fledged Olympic sport at the 1998 Winter Games in Nagano, Japan.
How It's Played
Curling can be looked at as lawn bowling on ice. The playing area, or "rink," is 46 yards long and 14 feet wide. At each end is a house, 12 feet in diameter. A mark called the button or tee in the center of the house is surrounded by concentric circles. The circles simply make it easier to judge distances; they have no effect on scoring.
Instead of rolling balls, curlers slide round stones down the ice, attempting to get as close as possible to the button. A stone has a maximum diameter of 36 inches and a maximum weight of 44 pounds. There's a handle at the top, and the bottom is concave to reduce friction.
Teams are made up of four players, led by a captain, or "skip". Each player delivers two stones, alternating with an opponent. The unique feature of curling is that a player's teammates use brooms to sweep the ice ahead of the stone, allowing it to go farther.
After all eight players are finished, the end (or inning) is complete. A team scores one point for each stone that's nearer to the tee than any of the other team's stones. Thus, only one team can score in any given end and the number of points can range from one to eight. If there are no stones in the house, or if the closest stones from the opposing teams are the same distance from the tee, there is no scoring for that end. A match is usually made up of 10 to 12 ends.
Curling is a highly tactical sport. Knocking an opponent's stone out of scoring territory is an important part of the sport, as is protecting a teammate's stone to make it difficult for an opponent to dislodge. Expert curlers, by putting spin on a stone, can make it curve (or "curl") a considerable distance to place it behind blocking stones.
