noun
( -s )
Etymology: from gerund of bowl (III)
: any of several games in which balls are rolled on a green outdoors or down an alley indoors at an object or group of objects ; especially : a game in which pins are set up in a usually triangular pattern at one end of an alley and balls rolled at them from the other end, the object being to knock down as many pins as possible with each ball — see candlepins, duckpins, lawn bowling , ninepins, tenpins; compare boccie , skittles