If you grew up in the UK it’s more than likely that conkers was a game that you grew up with. Conker is a staple of most Brits’ childhoods. The English countryside and city parks are awash with Horse Chestnut trees, each Autumn each of which rains spikey green husks and their fruit - the fabled brown ‘conker’ nut.
Unlike other nuts, the horse chestnut isn’t edible. It isn’t poisonous as such (i.e. it won’t kill you), however you won’t find it served up salted next to an ice-cold beer. So if you can’t eat it, then what can do you do with it. The answer is of course to ‘fight with it’!
I’m not 100% sure what the history of conkers is, however I’m guessing whoever first came across the humble conker tried to eat it (as it does indeed look very tasty); failing the taste-test, I guess the next stop was making stuff from it - like jewellery. But what sane girlfriend would accept a wooden conker necklace when they could have a gold and diamond necklace instead. So, having failed the gifting-use, all the conker was left for was to play with. I imagine people threw them at each other first, but then came the ‘smashing innovation’, and there came what is today known as the game of conkers. A game in which players attempt to smash the other’s nut - attached to a string. A simple but transformative innovation.
Conker rules explained
The game of conkers isn’t particularly complicated, which is one of its charms. Beyond trying to smash the other person’s conker, the rules of conkers are as follows:
Each player faces each other 1m apart
One player ‘presents’ their conker, holding their conker out (hanging on a string)
The other player then attempts to hit the opposition’s conker, taking x3 attempts
The players then alternate until one of the conkers is smashed
The thrill of the win
Conker scoring works by simple accruing points from your opponent as you win. For example, if you play your first game against someone who’s also playing their first game, then you would win 1 point. If then play someone else and they have a conker worth 1 point, and you win, your conker would then be worth 2 points (or in conker parlance be a two-er). Then if you go and play someone whose conker is worth say 5 points, you’d add their 5 points to your 2 points, making yours now worth 7 points (or a seven-er) - and so on.
The joy of collecting
Beyond the game itself, the other joy of conkers is searching for and collecting conkers as they fall from the trees in Autumn. Freshly out of their prickly husks conkers have a wonderful sheen, showing off wonderful layers of woody texture - mahogany and fresh oak rolled into one.
For 8 year-olds and grown men alike, collecting conkers is addictive - eternally searching for the biggest; the disappointment of finding a whale and then discovering it’s a twin 😢
Dispelling myths and explaining facts around conkers
The game of conkers is something that’s traditionally been reliant on word-of-mouth, something that’s been passed between generations without very much being written down. Given that there isn’t an official conkers rule book, it’s interesting to see how extensively the game of conkers has spread, and how consistent the rules are across the UK. Everyone pretty much understands the basic rules, how scoring works and are also familiar with extended rules like ‘stampsies’ (something that isn’t really an official rule, but has been widely embraced as an alternative rule).
Over the last 20 years, Google has of course changed how knowledge is shared amongst people and taken away raw dynamic of word-of-mouth traditions. And of course YouTube and other video platforms have further amplified this dynamic shift, to a dynamic where it’s possible to broadcast information (or disinformation).
One core element of Peckham Conker Club is to provide a level of expert knowledge and know-how around conkers - laying out the rules; explaining how to win (and cheat); providing options to buy the tools to enable you to battle and be the best. Our conker knowledge-bank is very much in its early stages, but we’ve started with a series of articles covering the basics of conkers, with video explainers to follow:
How to prepare a conker (inc a guide to stringing conkers)
Making conkers great again
In the spirit of the self-styled greatest US President of all time Donald Trump, I guess the underlying aim of creating Peckham Conker Club is to 'make conkers great again’. We’re pulling on the nostalgia we all have for conkers, and adding a bit of sparkle and pizzazz to encourage more people to play; youngsters to start playing and collecting, and bringing back the raw joy of conkers for an older generation.