page_title: Pétanque
section_title: Global spread of the game
hierarchical_section_title: Pétanque / History / Global spread of the game
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: joueurs de pétanque à Cannes (France)
context_page_description: Pétanque is a sport that falls into the category of boules sports, along with raffa, bocce, boule lyonnaise, lawn bowls and crown green bowling. In all of these sports, players or teams play their boules/balls towards a target ball.
  In pétanque the objective is to score points by having boules closer to the target than your opponent after all boules have been thrown. This is achieved by throwing or rolling boules closer to the small target ball, called a cochonnet, or by hitting the opponents' boules away from the target, while standing inside a circle with both feet on the ground.
  The game is normally and best played on hard dirt or gravel. It can be played in public areas in parks, or in dedicated facilities called boulodromes.
  The current form of the game originated in 1907 or 1910 in La Ciotat, in Provence, France. The French name pétanque comes from petanca in the Provençal dialect of the Occitan language, deriving from the expression pès tancats, meaning 'feet fixed' or 'feet planted'.
context_section_description: After the development of the all-metal boule, pétanque spread rapidly from Provence to the rest of France, then to the rest of Europe, and then to Francophone colonies and countries around the globe. Today, many countries have their own national governing bodies.
  In France, the Fédération Française de Pétanque et Jeu Provençal (FFPJP) has more than 300,000 licensed members.
  There are strong national federations in Germany, Spain, and England.  Petanque is actively played in many nations with histories of French colonial influence, especially in Southeast Asia, including Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Puducherry, India, as well as some parts of Africa.  Today, some of the strongest players in the world come from Madagascar and Thailand.
  Pétanque was featured at the 2015 All-Africa Games, which were hosted by the Republic of Congo, a former French colony.
  Petanque is not widely played in the Americas.  There is a Canadian petanque federation based in Québec. In the United States the Federation of Petanque USA (FPUSA) reports that about 30,000 play nationwide. As of December 1, 2015, FPUSA counted 2141 members in the US, in 52 affiliated clubs.
  On the international level, the governing body of petanque is the Fédération Internationale de Pétanque et Jeu Provençal (FIPJP).  It was founded in 1958 in Marseille and has about 600,000 members in 52 countries as of 2002.
caption: Pétanque players in Cannes
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