| 1598 | Creckett’ referred to in a court ease in Guildford during an argument over a piece of land” A witness, John: Derrick, stated that when a schoolboy he and his friends played ‘creckett’ on the land about 50 years previously. |
| 1611 | Two young men fined for playing cricket on Sunday in Sidlesham, West Sussex. |
| 1611 | ‘Crosse’ is defined in Randle Cotgrave’s French-English Dictionary as ‘a cricket staffe’ or the ‘crooked staff wherein boyes play at cricket’. Cotgrave went to St John’s College, Cambridge, in I587, and was in the Inner Temple ln 1591. |
| 1613 | An assault with a ‘cricket staffe’ in a court ease. the assault taking place at Wanborough, near Guildford. |
| 1622 | A number of youths ‘playing at cricket in the churchyard’ at Boxgrove, West Sussex |
| 1624 | Inquest on Jasper Vinall, accidentally hit with a ‘cricket batt’ while trying to catch the ball – a group were playing cricket on Horsted Green, Sussex |
| 1629 | Henry Cuffin brought before the Archdeacon’s court for ‘playing at cricketts’ immediately after divine service. Cuffin was curate of Ruckinge, Kent |
| 1636 | Henry Mabbinck stated he played cricket ‘in the parke’, West Horsley, Surrey – a Court case re a tithe dispute. |
| 1640 | A court case involving land at Chevening, Kent, mentions cricket being played there ‘about 10 years since’. |
| 1640 | The Revd Thomas Wilson charged some cricketers with playing on a Sunday, smashing a window, endangering the life of a child, Maidstone, Kent. |
| 1646 | A court ease at Coxheath, near Maidstone, involving a match and betting on cricket, |
| 1648 | Court case about the death of Thomas Hatter, wounded when struck by a cricket bat at Selsey, West Sussex |
| 1652 | Court ease involving the playing of cricket in Cranbrook, Kent. |
| 1654 | Money received for misdemeanours by ‘Cricket players’ on the Lord,s Day, Eltham, Kent. |
| 1656 | Cricket banned in Ireland – Cromwell’s Commissioners clearly mistook hurling for cricket. |
| 1658 | Cricket-ball referred to as such for the first time, in a book by Edward Phillips (1630-1696), nephew of Milton. The book was published in London. Phillips was tutor to the son of the diarist John Evelyn, when the latter was living in Deptford, |
| 1666 | ‘He saw your son very well engaged in a game at cricquett on Richmond Green”‘ Letter from Str Robert Paston, Richmond ln Surrey |
| 1666 | St Alban’s cricket club formed. No evidence; probably a misread date – 1666 should be 1806. |
| 1668 | Reference to the sale of drink at cricket matches, ln Maidstone, |
| 1668 | Court case concerning the ‘playinge at crickett and strokebase, at Shoreham’ Kent. |
| 1668 | Landlord of the Ram Inn, Smithfield, rated for a Cricket Field – this is a misreading of the Clerkenwell Rate Book. |
| 1671 | Edward Bound charged with playing cricket on Sunday – exonerated’. Shere, Surrey. |
| 1677 | ‘Pd to my Lord when his Lordship went to the crekitt match at ye Dicker.’ Dicker ln East Sussex. From the Earl of Sussex’s Accounts |
| 1678 | The first edition of Dr Adam Littleton’s Linguae Latinae Liber Dictlionarus’ Quadripartitus: A Latin Dictionary in Four Parts defines cricket as ‘a play’ ludus, Ludus baculi & pilae (game of stick and ball). He also defines the Latin word ,vibia’ as: ‘A pole or stick laid across on Forks, like the cricket-bar at bat-play” Littleton was educated at Westminster (and Christ Church, Oxford) and later taught at the school, |
| 1694 | ‘2/6 pald for a wagger about a cricket match at Lewis,’ steward’s Accounts of Sir John Pelham, who lived at Halland, West Sussex’ |
| 1697 | ‘The middle of last week a great match at Cricket was played in Sussex there were eleven of a side, and they played for fifty guineas apiece” Foreign Post,7 July |
