Mancala
Mancala is one of the oldest known games to still be widely played today. "Mancala" is a generic name for a family of two-player turn-based strategy board games played with small stones, beans, or seeds and rows of holes or pits in the earth, a board or other playing surface. The objective is usually to capture all or some set of the opponent's pieces. Versions of the game date back to the 7th century, and evidence suggests the game existed in ancient Egypt.
Backgammon
The "jeux de tables" (Games of Tables), predecessors of modern backgammon, first appeared in France during the 11th century and became a favorite pastime of gamblers. In 1254, Louis IX issued a decree prohibiting his court officials and subjects from playing. Tables games were played in Germany in the 12th century, and had reached Iceland by the 13th century. In Spain, the Alfonso X manuscript "Libro de los juegos", completed in 1283, describes rules for a number of dice and table games in addition to its extensive discussion of chess. By the 17th century, table games had spread to Sweden. A wooden board and checkers were recovered from the wreck of the Vasa among the belongings of the ship's officers. Backgammon appears widely in paintings of this period, mainly those of Dutch and German painters (Van Ostade, Jan Steen, Hieronymus Bosch, Bruegel and others). Some surviving artworks are "Cardsharps" by Caravaggio (the backgammon board is in the lower left) and "The Triumph of Death" by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (the backgammon board is in the lower right). Others are the Hell of Bosch and interior of an Inn by Jan Steen.