Shuffling back through the ages to the game’s origins

Hey, hipsters: You didn’t invent shuffleboard, so before you start hurling biscuits, you should know the story of the modern game:

Shuffleboard originated in the British court of the 16th century. Back then, shuffleboard consisted of sliding coins across a polished table as a form of gambling. King Henry VIII is said to have been a devotee.

The standing version of this game of kings arrived in America in the 1920s, as an offshoot of “deck shuffleboard,” a game popular on Dutch cruise ships.

Giant shuffleboard palaces such as Zephyrhills and the St. Petersburg soon opened in Florida. But the game didn’t have its golden age until a few decades later, when the clubs became a hit with retirees — and then with the grandkids who visited them. There is a geographic purity to shuffleboard: Each court has two large triangles painted on either end, divided into scoring areas worth 10 at the apex and others worth seven or eight points, depending on the zone’s size.

Each team has four biscuits to play, per round. To score, biscuits must stop entirely within the area and cannot touch any lines.

Biscuits that are tossed too far may end up in “the kitchen,” a deduction of 10 points.

Like in boccie or curling, players are encouraged to use strategy to knock their opponents’ biscuits off the court and to protect their own.