In 1457, the Scottish Parliament banned golf. Not discouraged it, banned it by Act of Parliament because too many men were on the links instead of practising their archery. It did not work. Six hundred years later, golf is one of the biggest reasons people book a flight to Scotland at all.

In this episode, Lesley traces golf's Scottish origins from stones knocked around coastal links land to the Act of Parliament that tried and failed to stamp it out. St Andrews and the Old Course, still public land at its heart, the eighteen-hole standard that exists purely because of a 1764 committee decision, and the Swilcan Bridge that every great golfer in history has stood on. The words the game gave the English language, including links, caddie, tee and fore, most of them Scots in origin. The story of Old Tom Morris and his son Young Tom, the younges ...