Chessboard
Board games have been known since ancient history, with the oldest records being paintings in mastabas of the First and Third Dynasties of Egypt (3100-2700 BC). The first known version of chess appeared around the 6th century in India and was called Chaturanga, played on a board of the game Ashtapada. This board was monochromatic and divided into eight columns by eight rows, with special marks called "castles" in the first, fourth, fifth, and eighth squares of the "a", "d", "e", and "h" columns, which served a function in Ashtapada, but not in Chaturanga.
Munsterbilzen Abbey
The sentence "Tesi samanunga vvas noble unde scona" ("This monastic community was noble and clean") plays an important role in the history of the Dutch language. The six words were added in 1130 under a list of names in the gospel of Munsterbilzen, a Carolingian manuscript. The gospel of Munsterbilzen also contains an Ordo Stellae (also called Officium Stellae), a three-kings game, which is considered to be the oldest play in the Netherlands. In December 2008, this precious codex threatened to be auctioned at the London auction house Sotheby's. Eventually, after much lobbying, the gospel libraries remained in possession of the Bollandists in Brussels, where it has been around since 1842.