Malays (ethnic group)
The Malays also have a variant of Mancala board game known as Congkak. The game is played by moving stones, marbles, beads or shells around a wooden board consisting of twelve or more holes. Mancala is acknowledged as the oldest game in the world and can be traced its origin since Ancient Egypt.
As the game dispersed around the globe, every culture has invented its own variation including the Malays.
Chess in the arts
Palatine Chapel in the Norman Palace in Palermo you can admire the first painting of a chess game that is known to the world. The work dates from around 1143 and the artists who created the Muslim players were chosen by the Norman king of Sicily Roger II of Hauteville, who erected the church.
The earliest known reference to chess in a European text is a Medieval Latin poem, "Versus de scachis". The oldest manuscript containing this poem has been given the estimated date of 997. Other early examples include miniatures accompanying books. Some of them have high artistic value. Perhaps the best known example is the 13th-century "Libro de los juegos". The book contains 151 illustrations, and while most of them are centered on the board, showing problems, the players and architectural settings are different in each picture. The pieces illustrating chess problems in Luca Pacioli's manuscript "De ludo scacchorum" () (c. 1500), described as "futuristic" even by today's standards, may have been designed by Leonardo da Vinci.