What is the oldest board game?
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.
The Master of Game
The Master of Game is a medieval book on hunting written by Edward of Norwich, 2nd Duke of York, between 1406 and 1413, of which 27 manuscripts survive. It is considered to be the oldest English-language book on hunting. It was reprinted in 1904 with a translation into modern English, an essay on medieval hunting, and a foreword by then-American President and noted hunter Theodore Roosevelt.
Tsoro
Tsoro is an ancient two-player mathematical strategy board game that has been played for over a thousand years. It has its roots in Zimbabwe and was first described in literature by J. B. Matthews in 1964. Tsoro belongs to the same class of African strategy board games collectively called Mancala, such as Oware, Bao, and Kalah.
DND (video game)
DND is one of the earliest role-playing video games. The name "DND" is derived from the abbreviation "D&D" from the original tabletop role-playing game "Dungeons & Dragons". The video game was first released in 1977.
History of role-playing games
Wargames have origins in ancient strategy games, particularly Chess. It originated as Chaturanga, created in the 6th-century Indian subcontinent as a simulation of ancient Indian warfare, particularly the Kurukshetra War (from the Indian epic "Mahabharata"), with pieces representing roles such as rajas, mantri (counselers), infantry, cavalry, chariots and war elephants. Chaturanga is considered the most ancient ancestor of "Dungeons & Dragons". According to RPG designer John Wick, Chess can be turned into a role-playing game if chess pieces such as the king, queen, rooks, knights or pawns are given names, and decisions are made based on their motivations. According to Wick, "Dungeons & Dragons" was a "sophisticated, intricate and complicated combat simulation board game that people were turning into a roleplaying game" just "like giving your rook a motive" in Chess.
Senet
Senet (or senat) is a board game from ancient Egypt, whose original rules are the subject of conjecture. The oldest hieroglyph resembling a senet game dates to around 3100 BC. The full name of the game in Egyptian is thought to have been "zn.t n.t ḥˁb", meaning the "game of passing".
Layli Goobalay
Layli Goobalay (or Layli Goobaly) is a board game played in parts of Somalia. It is a variant of the classical count and capture game "mancala" (from the Arabic word "naqala", meaning literally "to move"), which is one of the oldest two-player strategy board games played throughout the world. "Layli Goobalay" means "to exercise with circles" in the Somali language.
Play-by-mail game
Correspondence chess has been played by mail for centuries. The boardgame "Diplomacy" has been played by mail since the 1960s, starting with a printed newsletter (a fanzine) written by John Boardman. More complex games, moderated entirely or partially by computer programs, were pioneered by Rick Loomis of Flying Buffalo in 1970. The first such game offered via major email services was "WebWar II" (based on Starweb and licensed from Flying Buffalo) from Neolithic Enterprises who accepted email turns from all of the major email services including CompuServe in 1983.
Board wargame
The beginning of the commercial board wargaming hobby is generally tied to the name "Avalon Hill" and the publication of "Tactics II" in 1958, along with "Gettysburg", the first board game designed to simulate a historical battle.
Game piece (hieroglyph)
The "Senet game" is recorded as the oldest boardgame in history, for which tokens are used.
Tukvnanawopi
Tûkvnanawöpi is a two-player abstract strategy board game played by the Hopi native American Indians of Arizona, United States. The game was traditionally played on a slab of stone, and the board pattern etched on it. Tukvnanawopi resembles draughts and Alquerque. Each player attempts to capture each other's pieces by hopping over them. It is unknown how old the game is; however, the game was published as early as 1907 in Stewart Culin's book "Games of the North American Indians Volume 2: Games of Skill".
Tables (board game)
In English, the word "tables" is derived from Latin "tabula". Its first use referring to board games documented by the Oxford English Dictionary was circa AD 700.
Snakes and Ladders
Snakes and Ladders is an ancient Indian board game regarded today as a worldwide classic. It is played between two or more players on a gameboard having numbered, gridded squares. A number of "ladders" and "snakes" are pictured on the board, each connecting two specific board squares. The object of the game is to navigate one's game piece, according to die rolls, from the start (bottom square) to the finish (top square), helped or hindered by ladders and snakes, respectively.
Dunhuang Go Manual
The Dunhuang Go Manual or Dunhuang Go Classic or simply the Classic of Go () is the earliest surviving manual on the strategic board game of Go (). Dating from the 6th century, it exists as a single manuscript that was discovered in the 'Library Cave' of the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang, China by Aurel Stein in 1907, and which is now in the collection of the British Library in London, England.
Immortal Game
The Immortal Game was a chess game played by Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritzky on 21 June 1851 in London, during a break of the first international tournament. The bold sacrifices made by Anderssen to secure victory have made it one of the most famous chess games of all time. Anderssen gave up both rooks and a bishop, then his queen, checkmating his opponent with his three remaining minor pieces. In 1996, Bill Hartson called the game an achievement "perhaps unparalleled in chess literature".
History of the board game Monopoly
The board game "Monopoly" has its origins in the early 20th century. The earliest known version of "Monopoly", known as "The Landlord's Game", was designed by an American, Elizabeth Magie, and first patented in 1904 but existed as early as 1902. Magie, a follower of Henry George, originally intended "The Landlord's Game" to illustrate the economic consequences of Ricardo's Law of Economic rent and the Georgist concepts of economic privilege and land value taxation. A series of board games was developed from 1906 through the 1930s that involved the buying and selling of land and the development of that land. By 1933, a board game had been created much like the version of "Monopoly" sold by Parker Brothers and its related companies through the rest of the 20th century, and into the 21st. Several people, mostly in the Midwestern United States and near the East Coast, contributed to the game's design and evolution.
Chaturanga
Chaturanga (; ""), or "catur" for short, is an ancient Indian strategy game that is commonly theorized to be the common ancestor of the board games chess, "shogi", "sittuyin", "makruk", "xiangqi" and "janggi".
Crokinole
The earliest known crokinole board was made by craftsman Eckhardt Wettlaufer in 1876 in Perth County, Ontario, Canada. It is said Wettlaufer crafted the board as a fifth birthday present for his son Adam, which is now part of the collection at the Joseph Schneider Haus, a national historic site in Kitchener, Ontario, with a focus on Germanic folk art. Several other home-made boards dating from southwestern Ontario in the 1870s have been discovered since the 1990s. A board game similar to crokinole was patented on 20 April 1880 by Joshua K. Ingalls (US Patent No. 226,615)
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.
Real-time strategy
In the United Kingdom, the earliest real-time strategy games are "Stonkers" by John Gibson, published in 1983 by Imagine Software for the ZX Spectrum, and "Nether Earth" for ZX Spectrum in 1987. In North America, the oldest game retrospectively classified as real-time strategy by several sources is "The Ancient Art of War" (1984), designed by Evryware's Dave and Barry Murry, followed by "The Ancient Art of War at Sea" in 1987.
Playing card
Playing cards may have been invented during the Tang dynasty around the 9th century AD as a result of the usage of woodblock printing technology. The first possible reference to card games comes from a 9th-century text known as the "Collection of Miscellanea at Duyang", written by Tang dynasty writer Su E. It describes Princess Tongchang, daughter of Emperor Yizong of Tang, playing the "leaf game" in 868 with members of the Wei clan, the family of the princess' husband. The first known book on the "leaf" game was called the "Yezi Gexi" and allegedly written by a Tang woman. It received commentary by writers of subsequent dynasties. The Song dynasty (960–1279) scholar Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072) asserts that the "leaf" game existed at least since the mid-Tang dynasty and associated its invention with the development of printed sheets as a writing medium. However, Ouyang also claims that the "leaves" were pages of a book used in a board game played with dice, and that the rules of the game were lost by 1067.
Genji Monogatari Emaki
The word "emaki" stems from the word "emakimono" meaning "picture scrolls". The emakimono picture scrolls consisted of two designs: Pictures that were painted on a scroll with text added to the same scroll or a number of paintings that accompanied passages of text and were joined together in a scroll. The first known picture scroll was produced in Japan during the late ninth or tenth century. The "Genji Monogatari" picture scroll, however, was produced in the early twelfth century. Not only is the "Genji Monogatari Emaki" the oldest surviving monogatari scroll but it is also the oldest surviving non-Buddhist scroll in Japan. There is no exact date to the scroll, but it is estimated to being sometime between 1120 and 1140, in which case it was created just a little over a century after Murasaki Shikibu wrote "The Tale of Genji".
Counting board
The oldest known counting board, the Salamis Tablet ("c." 300 BC) was discovered on the Greek island of Salamis in 1899. It is thought to have been used by the Babylonians in about 300 BC and is more of a gaming board than a calculating device. It is marble, about 150 x 75 x 4.5 cm, and is in the Greek National museum in Athens. It has carved Greek letters and parallel grooves.
De Bellis Antiquitatis
De Bellis Antiquitatis or DBA (English: Of the Wars of Antiquity) is a fast play set of rules for the hobby of historical miniature wargaming, particularly ancient and medieval wargaming in the period 3000 BC to 1520 AD. Now in 3rd edition. These rules allow entire armies to be represented by less than 50 figures. The rules also include diagrams and over 600 army lists. DBA is produced by the Wargames Research Group and was the first game in the DBx series, which now includes De Bellis Multitudinis, De Bellis Magistrorum Militum (DBMM, a successor or alternative to DBM), Hordes of the Things (a fantasy version), De Bellis Renationis (DBR, a Renaissance version). and for 1700-1920 Horse Foot and Guns (HFG) An online video game titled "DBA Online" was also created.
Nine men's morris
According to R. C. Bell, the earliest known board for the game includes diagonal lines and was "cut into the roofing slabs of the temple at Kurna in Egypt"; he estimated a date for them of  BCE. However, Friedrich Berger wrote that some of the diagrams at Kurna include Coptic crosses, making it "doubtful" that the diagrams date to 1400 BCE. Berger concluded, "certainly they cannot be dated."
Bao (game)
As with most traditional mancalas, precise historical information on the origins and diffusion of Bao is missing. Early accounts and archaeological findings are arguable as there are many games that are similar to Bao in both equipment and rules. For example, a 1658 account by French governor Étienne de Flacourt about a game played by the Sakalava people in northwestern Madagascar is sometimes quoted as the earliest reference to Bao, but scholars are more cautious about identifying Flacourt's game with Bao proper. The study of archaeological findings of boards usually relies on the assumption that boards having a square hole in a certain position (that of the "nyumba", see below) are associated to Bao, as it is the only known mancala to have such feature. Nevertheless, as traditional boards are made of wood, ancient evidence of the game of Bao is unlikely to be found. As of today, the oldest Bao board is supposed to be one from Malawi, exposed at the British Museum, and dating back to no earlier than 1896. One of the first written accounts of Bao as played in the Swahili world is due to British orientalist Thomas Hyde, who saw it played in 1658 in Anjouan (Comoros).
Backgammon
Race board games involving dice have existed for millennia in the Near East and eastern Mediterranean, including the game senet of Ancient Egypt. The ancient Egyptian game senet was excavated, along with illustrations, from Egyptian royal tombs dating to 3500 BC. Though using a board that is quite different from backgammon, it may be a predecessor.
History of games
Among the earliest examples of a board game is "senet", a game found in Predynastic and First Dynasty burial sites in Egypt (circa 3500 BCE and 3100 BCE, respectively) and in hieroglyphs dating to around 3100 BCE. The game was played by moving draughtsmen on a board of 30 squares arranged into three parallel rows of ten squares each. The players strategically moved their pieces based on the throw of sticks or bones. The goal was to reach the edge of the board first. Senet slowly evolved over time to reflect the religious beliefs of the Egyptians. The pieces represented human souls and their movement was based on the journey of the soul in the afterlife. Each square had a distinct religious significance, with the final square being associated with the union of the soul with the sun god Re-Horakhty. Senet may have also been used in a ritual religious context.
Brelan
In England, Brelan eventually developed into the game of Brag, also Bragg, where the possibility of bluffing is an important part of the game. It evidently derived from the game of Brelan and later evolved into Bouillotte, which flourished during the French Revolution. Most experts believe that all these earlier card games played an important part in the formation of modern Poker, the most famous representative of a very ancient and always very popular family of games, all of which can be traced even further back to the old French game of Gilet ("Gillet", "Gile" or "Trionfetti"), which may be considered the most ancient European ancestor of Poker.
Liubo
Then with bamboo dice and ivory pieces the game of Liu Bo is begun;
Sides are taken; they advance together; keenly they threaten each other.
Pieces are kinged and the scoring doubled. Shouts of ‘five white!’ arise.
The earliest Liubo boards to have been discovered are a pair of ornately decorated stone boards from a 4th-century BCE tomb in the royal tomb complex of the State of Zhongshan at Pingshan in Hebei.
The game reached its greatest popularity during the Han Dynasty, as is evidenced by the discovery of many examples of Liubo boards or sets of Liubo game pieces as grave goods in high status tombs dating to the Han Dynasty. Pottery or wooden figurines of players with model Liubo boards have also been discovered in some Han tombs. Engraved picture stones (畫像石) and moulded picture bricks (畫像磚) that were widely used to decorate tombs and temples during the Eastern Han period (25–220 CE) also frequently depict people playing Liubo, sometimes as a small part of a complex scene depicting many different activities, but sometimes as the focal point of the scene, with the players attended by servants and playing in the cool of a pavilion. Some picture stones and engravings on stone coffins, especially those from the area of modern Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, show two winged immortals playing Liubo on a mountain, usually as part of a larger scene depicting the Queen Mother of the West and various mythical animals.
Parke H. Davis
...abundant evidence may be marshalled to prove that this is the oldest outdoor game in existence. In the 22nd chapter of Isaiah is found the verse, "He will turn and toss thee like a ball." This allusion, slight as it may be, is sufficient unto the antiquary to indicate that some sort of game with a ball existed as early as 750 years before the Christian era, the epoch customarily assigned to the Book of Isaiah.
Salamis Island
The oldest known counting board was discovered on Salamis Island in 1899. It is thought to have been used by the Babylonians in about 300 BC and is more of a gaming board rather than a calculating device. It is marble, about , and has carved Greek symbols and parallel grooves.
Rime table
The oldest known rhyme tables are a version of the "Yunjing" published with prefaces dated 1161 and 1203, and the "Qiyin lüe", which was included in the 1161 encyclopedia "Tongzhi". The two are very similar, and are believed to be derived from a single version pre-dating the Song dynasty. The tables were accompanied by a body of teachings known as "mēnfǎ" (), including rules for placing fanqie spellings that did not conform to the system within the tables.
List of best-selling game consoles
A handheld game console is a lightweight device with a built-in screen, games controls, speakers, and has greater portability than a standard video game console. It is capable of playing multiple games unlike tabletop and handheld electronic game devices. Tabletop and handheld electronic game devices of the 1970s and 1980s are the precursors of handheld game consoles. Mattel introduced the first handheld electronic game with the 1977 release of "Auto Race". Later, several companies—including Coleco and Milton Bradley—made their own single-game, lightweight tabletop or handheld electronic game devices. The oldest handheld game console with interchangeable cartridges is the Milton Bradley Microvision in 1979. Nintendo is credited with popularizing the handheld console concept with the Game Boy's release in 1989 and continues to dominate the handheld console market.
Five-card stud
Five-card stud is the earliest form of the card game stud poker, originating during the American Civil War, but is less commonly played today than many other more popular poker games. It is still a popular game in parts of the world, especially in Finland where a specific variant of five-card stud called Sökö (also known as Canadian stud or Scandinavian stud) is played. The word "sökö" is also used for checking in Finland ("I check" = "minä sökötän").
Blue and Gray (board game)
Blue and Gray is a strategy board game for two players invented by Henry Busch and Arthur Jaeger in 1903. They obtained a patent for the game, but may never have published it. Blue and Gray was featured in the book "A Gamut of Games" (1969) by Sid Sackson. It was also featured in "The Book of Classic Board Games" (1991) by Klutz Press under the name Cats and Dogs. In this book, the game was ranked among the top 15 board games of all time, including checkers, backgammon, Go, and mancala. The game is also known as Wild West, Thumps Game, and Captain and Soldiers. The name Blue and Gray "refers to the uniforms of the South and the North in the Civil War and in the original game the playing pieces of the contestants were of those colors."
Rithmomachy
Rithmomachy (or Rithmomachia, also Arithmomachia, Rythmomachy, Rhythmomachy, or sundry other variants; sometimes known as The Philosophers' Game) is a highly complex, early European mathematical board game. The earliest known description of it dates from the eleventh century. A literal translation of the name is "The Battle of the Numbers". The game is much like chess, except most methods of capture depend on the numbers inscribed on each piece.
Tables (board game)
The ancient Egyptians played a game called Senet, which belonged to the same family of "race games" as modern tables games, with moves controlled by the roll of dice as early as 3500 BC. The Royal Game of Ur, played in ancient Mesopotamia, is another member of the family. Recent excavations at the "Burnt City" in Iran showed that a similar game existed there around 3000 BC. The artifacts include two dice and 60 pieces. The set is believed to be 100 to 200 years older than the sets found in Ur. Though they are all race games they cannot be direct ancestors of backgammon.
Portland Club (London)
The Portland Club is a London card-playing game club and the recognised early authority on the games of whist and bridge. It is reputedly the oldest card club in the world. Founded some time before 1815 as the Stratford Club, it was given its present name in 1825.
Science and technology of the Tang dynasty
Playing cards may have been invented during the Tang dynasty around the 9th century AD as a result of the usage of woodblock printing technology. The first possible reference to card games comes from a 9th-century text known as the "Collection of Miscellanea at Duyang", written by Tang dynasty writer Su E. It describes Princess Tongchang, daughter of Emperor Yizong of Tang, playing the "leaf game" in 868 with members of the clan of Wei Baoheng, the family of the princess' husband. The first known book on the "leaf" game was called the "Yezi Gexi" and allegedly written by a Tang woman. It received commentary by writers of subsequent dynasties. The Song dynasty (960–1279) scholar Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072) asserts that the "leaf" game existed at least since the mid-Tang dynasty and associated its invention with the development of printed sheets as a writing medium. However, Ouyang also claims that the "leaves" were pages of a book used in a board game played with dice, and that the rules of the game were lost by 1067.
Brax (game)
Brax is a two-player abstract strategy board game. It was invented in 1889 (or shortly before) in America by Frederic B Denham of New York City. The board design is unique. There are several marked paths on the board where a player moves their pieces. A piece can move one or two spaces in a turn depending upon the color of the path. Players attempt to capture each other's pieces.
Dots and Boxes
Dots and Boxes is a pencil-and-paper game for two players (sometimes more). It was first published in the 19th century by Édouard Lucas, who called it la pipopipette. It has gone by many other names, including the game of dots, boxes, dot to dot grid, and pigs in a pen.
Starting with an empty grid of dots, two players take turns adding a single horizontal or vertical line between two "unjoined" adjacent dots. The player who completes the fourth side of a 1×1 box earns one point and takes another turn. (A point is typically recorded by placing a mark that identifies the player in the box, such as an initial.) The game ends when no more lines can be placed. The winner is the player with the most points. The board may be of any size. When short on time, a 2×2 board (a square of 9 dots) is good for beginners. A 5×5 is good for experts.
Backgammon
Touraj Daryaee (2006)—on the subject of the first written mention of early precursors of backgammon—writes:
In the 11th century "Shahnameh", the Persian poet Ferdowsi credits Burzoe with the invention of the tables game "nard" in the 6th century. He describes an encounter between Burzoe and a Raja visiting from India. The Raja introduces the game of chess, and Burzoe demonstrates "nard", played with dice made from ivory and teak. Today, Nard is the name for the Persian version of backgammon, which has different initial positions and objectives. H. J. R. Murray details many versions of backgammon; modern Nard is noted there as being the same as backgammon and maybe dating back to 300–500 AD in the Babylonian Talmud, although others believe the Talmud references the Greek race game Kubeia.
Congkak
The oldest mancala game boards were found in a ruined fort of Roman Egypt and date back to the 4th century AD. The game was likely introduced to Southeast Asia by Indian in the 15th century.
Mancala
Some historians believe that Mancala is the oldest game in the world based on the archaeological evidence found in Jordan that dates around 6000 BCE. The game might have been played by ancient Nabataeans and could have been an ancient version of the modern Mancala game.
Although the games existed in pockets in Europe—it is recorded as being played as early as the 17th century by merchants in England—it has never gained much popularity in most regions, except in the Baltic area, where once it was a very popular game ("Bohnenspiel"), and Bosnia, where it is called Ban-Ban and still played today. Mancala has also been found in Serbia and in Greece ("Mandoli", Cyclades). Two Mancala tables from the early 18th century are to be found in Weikersheim Castle in southern Germany.
Sáhkku
Likewise, Michaelsen speculates that the in some variants the third pieces may have been not queens but king's children inspired by the Sámi board game dablo which has such pieces. Tablut was documented in the 1700s, while dablo was mainly documented in the 1800s and early 1900s. Both of these are, like sáhkku, specifically Sámi board games that belong to a larger family of games – tablut is of the North European tafl family, while dablo is of the alquerque family that has its earliest traceable roots in the Middle East, and came to Europe through Spain.
History of games
In Ancient Greece and in the Roman Empire, popular games included ball games (Episkyros, Harpastum, Expulsim Ludere - a kind of handball), dice games (Tesserae), knucklebones, Bear games, Tic-tac-toe (Terni Lapilli), Nine Men's Morris (mola) and various types of board games similar to checkers. Both Plato and Homer mention board games called 'petteia' (games played with pessoi', i.e. 'pieces' or 'men'). According to Plato, they are all Egyptian in origin. The name 'petteia' seems to be a generic term for board game and refers to various games. One such game was called 'poleis' (city states) and was a game of battle on a checkered board.
Chinese playing cards
Playing cards () were most likely invented in China during the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279). They were certainly in existence by the Mongol Yuan dynasty (1271-1368). Chinese use the word "pái" (), meaning "plaque", to refer to both playing cards and tiles. Many early sources are ambiguous if they don't specifically refer to paper "pái" (cards) or bone "pái" (tiles). In terms of game play, there is no difference; both serve to hide one face from the other players with identical backs. Card games are examples of imperfect information games as opposed to Chess or Go.
Ludo (board game)
Pachisi was rediscovered in India by the 6th century. The earliest evidence of this game evolution in India is the depiction of boards on the caves of Ellora. Even Pachisi was evolved from a very ancient game of Chausar played in the times of epic Mahabharata (Kurukshetra War time) about 10 century BCE. This game was played between the pandavas and kauravas. Latest version as we describe as Ludo, was played by the Mughal emperors of India; a notable example is Akbar.
Catch the Hare
The game is the earliest recorded hunt game in Europe, and perhaps even the first hunt game from Europe (other than Bear games and Hare games). The earliest record of the game is in Alfonso X's "Libro de los juegos" or "Book of Games" in 1283. The record shows a game called cercar la liebre, a game played in Spain from the 13th. century until today. Cercar la liebre means "corner the rabbit", but it was the game historian H.J.R. Murray who (perhaps mistakenly) called it "Catch the Hare". The Moors may have brought the game to Spain since it uses an Alquerque board, however, there is no record of the game or any similar game in Arabic literature. Cercar la liebre evolved into many variants around the world including the games of Fox and Geese. The game has spread to Central and North America thanks to the Spanish who brought it with them during their conquest. The game was transformed in name and structure by the American natives. The new names given were pon chochotl or coyote and chickens according to game historians Stewart Culin and David Parlett, and "they were played by the Papago Indians of Arizona and the Tew Tribe of New Mexico who play on the same board as Alfonso’s cercar la liebre", and Indian and jackrabbits which are things found in the Americas. Mexicans play on one version with only two main diagonals, and this is described by Stewart Culin in his book "Chess and Playing Cards: Catalogue of Games and Implements for Divination Exhibited by the United States National Museum in Connection with the Department of Archaeology and Paleontology of the University of Pennsylvania at the Cotton States and International Exposition" (1895), and calls it coyote, a game from Mexico, with only the main diagonal lines present. In some cases the diagonal lines were completely removed making it difficult to classify with the other tiger games such as Bagh-Chal, Rimau-rimau, and Buga-shadara. But other hunt games such as Sua Ghin Gnua and Tiger and Buffaloes also do not have diagonal lines but may still be classified as tiger games.
Tabula (game)
According to the "Etymologiae" by Isidore of Seville, tabula was first invented by a Greek soldier of the Trojan War named Alea. The earliest description of "τάβλι" (tavli) is in an epigram of Byzantine emperor Zeno (r. 474–475; 476–491), given by Agathias of Myrine (6th century AD), who describes a game in which Zeno goes from a strong position to a very weak one after an unfortunate dice roll. The rules of Tabula were reconstructed in the 19th century by Becq de Fouquières based upon this epigram. The game was played on a board nearly identical to a modern backgammon board with 24 points, 12 on each side. Two players had 15 pieces each, and moved them in opposing directions around the board, according to the roll of three dice. A piece resting alone in a space on the board was vulnerable to being hit. Hitting a blot, reentering a piece from the bar, and bearing off, all had the same rules as today. The only differences with modern backgammon were the use of an extra die (three rather than two) and the starting of all pieces off the board (with them entering in the same way that pieces on the bar enter in modern backgammon).
Indoor games and sports
Games such as Monopoly and backgammon are a mixture of chance and skill. Even though luck (usually the throw of dice) plays a part, choices made by the players in the course of the game also help to decide the winner. Backgammon is one of the oldest board games that people still play. Its name comes from the Saxon (it means ‘back game’ because sometimes pieces have to go back to the beginning), but the Romans played this game too.
Lexiko
In 1931, Butts wrote a paper entitled "Study of Games." In his paper, he described three categories of games: board, number games using playing cards or dice, and letter games (or games that fell into more than one). He noted that, although the most popular games were of the first two (e.g. Chess and Backgammon), the best letter game readily available was Anagrams. Around that time, he was reading "The Gold Bug" by Edgar Allan Poe and noticed a line containing the English letter distribution. This gave him an epiphany: Anagrams would be more fun if the most common letters in English were more common in the game. He carefully analyzed letter frequencies in newspapers and other printed works to determine the ideal letter distribution for the game. With a few other changes, he named his project "Lexiko". The game design was rejected by games manufacturers such as Parker Brothers and Milton Bradley, but Butts was able to sell copies on his own, though not enough to recoup his development expenses. In 1938, he began work on a board game based on "Lexiko", which he called "Criss-Cross Words", which was eventually renamed "Scrabble".
Game design
Traditional board games date from the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Whereas ancient board game design was primarily focused on rules alone, traditional board games were often influenced by Victorian mores. Academic (e.g. history and geography) and moral didacticism were important design features for traditional games, and Puritan associations between dice and the Devil meant that early American game designers eschewed their use in board games entirely. Even traditional games that did use dice, like "Monopoly" (based on the 1906 "The Landlord's Game"), were rooted in educational efforts to explain political concepts to the masses. By the 1930s and 1940s, board game design began to emphasize amusement over education, and characters from comic strips, radio programmes, and (in the 1950s) television shows began to be featured in board game adaptations.
String figure
"Of the games people play, string figures enjoy the reputation of being the most widespread form of amusement in the world: more cultures are familiar with string figures than with any other game. Over 2,000 individual patterns have been recorded worldwide since 1888, when anthropologist Franz Boas first described a pair of Inuit string figures (Boas 1888a, 1888b, Abraham 1988:12)." String figures are probably one of humanity's oldest games, and is spread among an astonishing variety of cultures, even ones as unrelated as Europeans and the Dayaks of Indonesia; Alfred Wallace who, while traveling in Borneo in the 1800s, thought of amusing the Dayak youths with a novel game with string, was in turn very surprised when they proved to be familiar with it, and showed him some figures and transitions that he hadn't previously seen. The anthropologist Louis Leakey has also attributed string figure knowledge with saving his life and described his use of this game in the early 1900s to obtain the cooperation of Sub-Saharan African tribes otherwise unfamiliar with, and suspicious of, Europeans, having been told by his teacher A.C. Haddon, "You can travel anywhere with a smile and a piece of string."
Board wargame
The most recent of the major types of board wargame, it was created by the game "We the People" published by Avalon Hill in 1994. In most aspects it is much like a typical board wargame (on the simpler side of the spectrum), but play is driven by a deck of cards that both players draw from. These cards control "activation points", which allow the use of troops, as well as events that represent things outside the normal scope of the game. Newer card driven games have helped reinvigorate the war game genre as well as other differently themed games. "Twilight Struggle", a game based on the Cold War, was ranked #1 on the website BoardGameGeek from December 2010 to January 2016. As of September 2018, it's ranked fifth overall but first for wargames.
History of games
First patented in 1904, "The Landlord's Game", designed by Elizabeth Magie, was originally intended to illustrate the economic consequences of Ricardo's Law of Economic rent and the Georgist concept of a single tax on land value. A series of board games were developed from 1906 through the 1930s that involved the buying and selling of land and the development of that land. By 1933, a board game had been created much like the version of modern Monopoly by the Parker Brothers. 
Though the first commercial version of the game of Battleship was "Salvo", published in 1931 in the United States by the Starex company, the game itself dates to before World War I when it was played on paper by Russian officers. The French board game "L'Attaque" was first commercially released in 1910, having been designed two years prior as a military-themed imperfect knowledge game based upon the earlier Chinese children's board game Dou Shou Qi. "L'Attaque" was subsequently adapted by the Chinese into Luzhanqi (or "Lu Zhan Jun Qi"), and by Milton Bradley into Stratego, the latter having been trademarked in 1960 while the former remains in the public domain. Jury Box, published in 1935, was the first murder mystery game which served as the basis for games like Cluedo.
Board game
Backgammon originated in ancient Persia over 5,000 years ago. Chess, Pachisi and Chaupar originated in India. Go and Liubo originated in China. Shax originated in Somalia. Bao (mancala game) is still played throughout eastern Africa. Patolli originated in Mesoamerica played by the ancient Aztec and The Royal Game of Ur was found in the Royal Tombs of Ur, dating to Mesopotamia 4,600 years ago. The earliest known games list is the Buddha games list.
Chess
The oldest archaeological chess artifacts, ivory pieces, were excavated in ancient Afrasiab, today's Samarkand, in Uzbekistan, central Asia, and date to about 760, with some of them possibly older. The oldest known chess manual was in Arabic and dates to 840–850, written by al-Adli ar-Rumi (800–870), a renowned Arab chess player, titled "Kitab ash-shatranj" (Book of the chess). This is a lost manuscript, but referenced in later works. The eastern migration of chess, into China and Southeast Asia, has even less documentation than its migration west. The first reference to chess, called "Xiang Qi", in China comes in the "xuán guaì lù" (玄怪录, record of the mysterious and strange) dating to about 800. Alternatively, some contend that chess arose from Chinese chess or one of its predecessors, although this has been contested.
Multiplication table
The oldest known multiplication tables were used by the Babylonians about 4000 years ago. However, they used a base of 60. The oldest known tables using a base of 10 are the Chinese decimal multiplication table on bamboo strips dating to about 305 BC, during China's Warring States period.
The multiplication table is sometimes attributed to the ancient Greek mathematician Pythagoras (570–495 BC). It is also called the Table of Pythagoras in many languages (for example French, Italian and Russian), sometimes in English. The Greco-Roman mathematician Nichomachus (60–120 AD), a follower of Neopythagoreanism, included a multiplication table in his "Introduction to Arithmetic", whereas the oldest surviving Greek multiplication table is on a wax tablet dated to the 1st century AD and currently housed in the British Museum.
Card game
The first playing cards appeared in the 9th century during Tang-dynasty China.
The first reference to the card game in world history dates no later than the 9th century, when the "Collection of Miscellanea at Duyang", written by Tang Dynasty writer Su E, described Princess (daughter of Emperor Yizong of Tang) playing the "leaf game" with members of the Wei clan (the family of the princess' husband) in 868 . The Song dynasty statesman and historian Ouyang Xiu has noted that paper playing cards arose in connection to an earlier development in the book format from scrolls to pages. During the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), characters from popular novels such as the "Water Margin" were widely featured on the faces of playing cards. A precise description of Chinese money playing cards (in four suits) survived from the 15th century. Mahjong tiles are a 19th-century invention based on three-suited money playing card decks, similar to the way in which Rummikub tiles were derived recently from modern Western playing cards.
Leela (game)
Leela is a board game with origins in ancient India. The original game was created by Hindu scholars with the intention of teaching moral values, and was a precursor to the modern game snakes and ladders.
The game was designed over two thousand years ago. It is a game of life which provides insight into human consciousness and a key to divine knowledge. One or more are able to play Leela by using the game board and book, a die, and a significant item that belongs to the player. One example of an item that can be used is a ring. This item serves as the player's symbol during the game.
History of games
The Tafl games were a family of ancient Germanic and Celtic board games played across much of Northern Europe from earlier than 400 CE until the 12th century. Although the rules of the games were never explicitly recorded, it seems to have been a game with uneven forces (2:1 ratio) and the goal of one side was to escape to the side of the board with a King while the other side's goal was to capture him. Tafl was spread by the Vikings throughout northern Europe, including Iceland, Britain, Ireland, and Lapland.
Playing card
The earliest dated instance of a game involving cards with suits and numerals occurred on 17 July 1294 when "Yan Sengzhu and Zheng Pig-Dog were caught playing cards [zhi pai] and that wood blocks for printing them had been impounded, together with nine of the actual cards."
Cat's cradle
Cat's cradle is one of the oldest games in recorded human history, and involves creating various string figures, either individually or by passing a loop of string back and forth between two or more players. The true origin of the name is debated, though the first known reference is in "The light of nature pursued" by Abraham Tucker in 1768. The type of string, the specific figures, their order, and the names of the figures vary. Independent versions of this game have been found in indigenous cultures throughout the world, including in Africa, Eastern Asia, the Pacific Islands, Australia, the Americas, and the Arctic.
Glossary of card game terms
eldest
Strassburg tablet
The Strassburg tablet, dating to c. 1800 BCE, is the oldest instance of algebra that has been found. The Strassburg tablet is often claimed to be the historical beginning point of algebra. The Strassburg tablet is a Babylonian tablet that was recently discovered.
Courier chess
Courier chess (or The Courier Game or simply courier) is a strategy board game in the chess family. The original form probably originated in the 12th century and is known to have been played for at least six hundred years. The game was subsequently replaced by a more modern form. It pioneered the modern chess bishop (called the "courier"), and probably played a part in evolving modern chess out of Medieval Chess.
Courier Chess is played on a board of eight by twelve . Literary and artistic evidence indicate that the board was checkered from the beginning, but that there was no consistency as to which squares were dark. The more frequent practice seems to be that the square at each player's lower-right is white.
Shuffleboard
The full history of shuffleboard is not known. Though there is some knowledge of its development, its actual origins, the place and date where it was first played, remain a mystery. Inevitably, this uncertainty gives rise to some debate, even disagreement, about which country can claim to have invented it. However there is no dispute concerning its age as a form of popular amusement, and in Europe has a history that goes back over 500 years.
Tables (board game)
The name nardshēr comes from the Persian "nard" (Wooden block) and "shēr" (lion) referring to the two type of pieces used in play. A common legend associates the game with the founder of the Sassanian dynasty, Ardashir I. The oldest known reference to the game is thought to be a passage in the Talmud.
Tarot
These were the oldest form of tarot deck to be made, being first devised in the 15th century in northern Italy. The so-called occult tarot decks are based on decks of this type. Three decks of this category are still used to play certain games:
Board game
Hounds and Jackals another ancient Egyptean board game appeared around 2000 BC. The first complete set of this game was discovered from a Theban tomb that dates to the 13th Dynasty. This game was also popular in Mesopotamia and the Caucasus.
Sáhkku
Daldøs is first mentioned in passing in a Danish work of fiction from 1876, the plot of which was set to the 1600s. The rules were not explained by the author, but an interested reader tracked down a person who knew the rules during the 1920s. The oldest surviving game set is no older than the early 1800s.
Ombre
Ombre () is a fast-moving seventeenth-century trick-taking card game for three players. Its history began in Spain around the end of the 16th century as a four-person game. It is one of the earliest card games known in Europe and by far the most classic game of its type, directly ancestral to Euchre, Boston and Solo Whist. Despite its difficult rules, complicated point score and strange foreign terms, it swept Europe in the last quarter of the 17th century, becoming "Lomber" in Germany, "Lumbur" in Austria and "Ombre" (originally pronounced 'umber') in England, occupying a position of prestige similar to contract bridge today.
History of games
The extinct Chinese board game "liubo" was invented no later than the middle of the 1st millennium BCE, and was popular during the Warring States period (476 BCE – 221 BCE) and the Han Dynasty (202 BCE – 220 CE). Although the game's rules have been lost, it was apparently a race game not unlike Senet in that playing pieces were moved about a board using sticks thrown to determine movement.
History of games
Chaturanga (which means 'quadripartite' and also 'army'), the predecessor of Chess, possibly developed in the Indian subcontinent or Central Asia during the Kushan (30–375 CE) or Gupta (320–550 CE) periods from an amalgamation of other game features and was transmitted to Sassanid Persia (where it was known as Shatranj) and China through the Silk Road. The oldest text to mention Chaturanga is the middle Persian work "Wizârîshn î chatrang ud nîhishn î nêw-ardakhshîr" (The explanation of Chatrang and the invention of Nard, c. 600 AD). This texts tells the arrival of Chatrang in an embassy from 'Hind' during the reign of Khosrau I (531–579). The name 'Hind' was often used to refer to eastern regions such as Balochistan. Another game named Chaturaji was similar but played with four sides of differing colors instead of two, however the earliest source for this four sided board game is Al-Biruni's 'India', circa 1030 AD. Historians of Chess such as Yuri Averbakh have surmised that the Greek board game "petteia" may have had an influence on the development of early Chaturanga. "Petteia" games could have combined with other elements in the Greco-Bactrian and Indo-Greek Kingdoms.
Put (card game)
Put is an English tavern trick-taking card game first recorded in the 16th century and later castigated by 17th century moralists as one of ill repute. It belongs to a very ancient family of card games and clearly relates to a group known as Trut, "Truque", also "Tru", and the South American game Truco. Its more elaborate version is the Spanish game of Truc, which is still much played in many parts of Southern France and Spain.
Rock–paper–scissors
Today, the best-known "sansukumi-ken" is called , which is a variation of the Chinese games introduced in the 17th century. "Jan-ken" uses the rock, paper, and scissors signs and is the game that the modern version of rock–paper–scissors derives from directly. Hand-games using gestures to represent the three conflicting elements of rock, paper, and scissors have been most common since the modern version of the game was created in the late 19th century, between the Edo and Meiji periods.
Netrek
Developed as a successor to 1986's "Xtrek", "Netrek" was first played in 1988. It was the third Internet game, the first Internet team game, and as of 2011 is the oldest Internet game still actively played. It pioneered many technologies used in later games and has been cited as prior art in patent disputes. "Xtrek" and "Netrek" are the oldest games of what is now called the MOBA genre.
Board wargame
The actual subject matter of wargames is broad, and many approaches have been taken over the years towards the goals of simulating wars on a grand or personal scale. Some of the more popular movements constitute established subgenres of their own that most wargamers will recognize.
The oldest of the subgenres, and the one that still retains "iconic" status for board wargaming as a whole, it got its start with the first board wargame, "Tactics" (which, ironically, used a square grid; hexes were a slightly later innovation), and is still used in many wargames today.
Madiao
Madiao (), also ma diao, ma tiu or ma tiao, is a late imperial Chinese trick-taking gambling card game, also known as the game of "paper tiger." The deck used was recorded by Lu Rong in the 15th century and the rules later by Pan Zhiheng and Feng Menglong during the early 17th century. Korean poet Jang Hon (1759-1828) wrote that the game dates back to the Yuan dynasty (1271-1368). It continued to be popular during the Qing dynasty until around the mid-19th century. The game was also known in Japan from at least 1791. It is played with 40 cards and four players.
Robert Charles Bell
Robert Charles Bell (1917–2002) was the author of several books on board games, most importantly "Board and Table Games 1 & 2" (reprinted as "Board and Table Games from Many Civilizations"). This work won the Premier Award of the Doctors' Hobbies Exhibition, London. He was instrumental in popularizing traditional games, and is acknowledged as one of 11 "principal sources" in David Parlett's "The Oxford History of Board Games".
Awithlaknannai Mosona
Awithlaknannai Mosona is a two-player strategy board game from the Zuni Native American Indian tribe of New Mexico, United States. It is unknown how old the game is. The game was described by Stewart Culin in his book "Games of the North American Indians Volume 2: Games of Skill" (1907). In this book, it was named Awithlaknan Mosona. Awithlaknannai Mosona resembles another Zuni board game called Kolowis Awithlaknannai (Fighting Serpents) with few minor differences. The former having a smaller board, and depending upon the variant, it also has less lines joining the intersection points. The rules are the same. Awithlaknannai Mosona belongs to the draughts and Alquerque family of games as pieces hop over one another when capturing. It is actually more related to Alquerque, since the board is made up of intersection points and lines connecting them. It is thought that the Spanish had brought Alquerque to the American Southwest, and Awithlaknannai Mosona may have been an evolution from Alquerque. However, in Stewart Culin's 1907 book, the Zunis claim that they had adopted a hunt game from Mexico similar to Catch the Hare and the Fox games of Europe, and transformed it into Awithlaknannai Mosona. In these games, one player has more pieces over the other, however, the other player's piece has more powers. The Zuni's equalized the numbers of pieces and their powers, and also may have transformed the board making its length far exceed its width. Diagonal lines also replaced orthogonal lines altogether. However, the hunt game from Mexico may have used an Alquerque board even though the game mechanics of their new game, Awithlaknannai Mosona, were completely different.
Card game
Playing cards first appeared in Europe in the last quarter of the 14th century. The earliest European references speak of a Saracen or Moorish game called "naib", and in fact an almost complete Mamluk Egyptian deck of 52 cards in a distinct oriental design has survived from around the same time, with the four suits "swords", "polo sticks", "cups" and "coins" and the ranks "king", "governor", "second governor", and "ten" to "one".
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.
Ashtapada
Ashtāpada () or Ashtapadi is an Indian board game which predates chess and was mentioned on the list of games that Gautama Buddha would not play. Chaturanga, which could be played on the same board, appeared sometime around the 6th century in India. It could be played by two to four participants.
Ulama (game)
Ulama () is a ball game played in a few communities in the Mexican state of Sinaloa. Descended from the Aztec version of the Mesoamerican ballgame, the game is one of the oldest continuously played sports in the world and is notable for the fact that it is the oldest known game using a rubber ball.
Chinese playing cards
Playing cards may have been invented during the Tang dynasty around the 9th century AD as a result of the usage of woodblock printing technology. The first possible reference to card games comes from a 9th-century text known as the "Collection of Miscellanea at Duyang", written by Tang dynasty writer Su E. It describes Princess Tongchang, daughter of Emperor Yizong of Tang, playing the "leaf game" in 868 with members of the clan of Wei Baoheng, the family of the princess' husband. The first known book on the "leaf" game was called the "Yezi Gexi" and allegedly written by a Tang woman. It received commentary by writers of subsequent dynasties. The Song dynasty (960–1279) scholar Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072) asserts that the "leaf" game existed at least since the mid-Tang dynasty and associated its invention with the development of printed sheets as a writing medium. However, Ouyang also claims that the "leaves" were pages of a book used in a board game played with dice, and that the rules of the game were lost by 1067.
Tafl games
Tafl games (also known as hnefatafl games) are a family of ancient Nordic and Celtic strategy board games played on a checkered or latticed gameboard with two armies of uneven numbers. Most probably it is based upon the Roman game Ludus latrunculorum.
Names of different variants of Tafl include Hnefatafl, Tablut, Tawlbwrdd, Brandubh, Ard Rí, and Alea Evangelii. Games in the tafl family were played in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Britain, Ireland, and Sápmi. Tafl gaming was eventually supplanted by chess in the 12th Century, but the tafl variant of the Sámi people, tablut, was in play until at least the 1700s. The rules for tablut were written down by the scientist Linnaeus in 1732, and these were translated from Latin to English in 1811. All modern tafl games are based on the 1811 translation, which had many errors. New rules were added to amend the issues resulting from these errors, leading to the creation of a modern family of tafl games. In addition, tablut is now also played in accordance with its original rules, which have been retranslated.
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.
Tables (board game)
The τάβλη of Zeno's time is believed to be a direct descendant of the earlier ancient Roman "Ludus duodecim scriptorum" ("game of twelve lines" or, better, "game of twelve signs") with that board's middle row of points removed, and only the two outer rows remaining. Ludus duodecim scriptorum used a board with three rows of 12 points each, and the pieces were moved across all three rows according to the roll of three dice. The earliest known mention of the game is in Ovid's "Ars Amatoria" ("The Art of Love") (written between 1 BC and 8 AD).
In the 11th century Shahnameh, the Persian poet Ferdowsi credits Burzoe with the invention of "nard" in the 6th century. He describes an encounter between Burzoe and a Raja visiting from India. The Raja introduces the game of chess, and Burzoe demonstrates nard, played with dice made from ivory and teak.
Poch
Poch, Pochen or Pochspiel () is a very old card game, which is recorded as early as 1441 in Strasbourg. Poch is considered one of the forerunners of poker, a game that developed in America in the 19th century. An etymological relationship between the game names is also assumed. Games related to Poch are the French "Glic" and "Nain Jaune" and the English Pope Joan. Other forerunners of poker and possible relatives of the game are the English game, Brag, from the 16th century and the French Brelan (later Bouillotte) and Belle, Flux et Trente-et-Un.
Tai shogi
Tai shogi (泰将棋 "tai shōgi" or 無上泰将棋 "mujō tai shōgi" "grand chess", renamed from 無上大将棋 "mujō dai shōgi" "supreme chess" to avoid confusion with 大将棋 "dai shōgi") is a large-board variant of shogi (Japanese chess). The game dates to the 15th century and is based on earlier large-board shogi games. Before the discovery of taikyoku shogi in 1997, tai shogi was believed to be the largest playable chess variant, if not board game, ever. One game may be played over several long sessions and require each player to make over a thousand moves. It was never a popular game; indeed, a single production of six game sets in the early 17th century was a notable event.
Backgammon
The history of backgammon can be traced back nearly 5,000 years to its origins in Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq). Excavations in Iraq have shown that a board race game existed there around 5000 BC. The world's oldest set of dice (made from human bone) were recently discovered in that part of the world. Modern Iraqis continue to enjoy playing the game. 
The Royal Game of Ur, originating in ancient Mesopotamia before 2600 BC, may also be an ancestor of modern-day table games like backgammon. It used tetrahedral dice. In the modern Middle East, backgammon is a common feature of coffeehouses. Race board games involving dice have a long history in Iraq, including the Royal Game of Ur in Babylon. Today the game is commonly played in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and other Arab countries.
Penultima
Penultima is a game of inductive logic, played on a chess board. It was invented by Michael Greene and Adam Chalcraft in Cambridge in 1994. The game is derived from the chess variant Ultima (otherwise known as "Baroque chess"), and played with a standard chess board and pieces, each piece having different movement and capture rules from standard chess. In a manner similar to the game Mao, which was a popular game in Cambridge at that time, the rules for each piece vary from game to game, and are initially kept secret from the players. Penultima is similar in style to Eleusis, Zendo and Mao. The name of the game is a pun on "penultimate", and "Ultima", the name of the chess variant.
Sunjang baduk
Sunjang baduk (Korean: 순장바둑) is a variant of the game go (known as "baduk" in Korean) played in Korea which dates to the 16th century. It became obscure in the 1950s when it was largely replaced by modern go due to Japanese influence. There are around 45 surviving game records of Sunjang baduk, mostly from the 1880s. The oldest known game record was published in the "Chosun Ilbo" newspaper on March 1937, although the game was played much earlier. The game is between No Sa-ch'o and Ch'ae Keuk-mun. Sunjang baduk is played on a 19x19 board with 17 marked points which are used as indicators. The first 16 stones are put in a preset pattern on the marked points and black must make their first move on the Tengen (the center point on the board). Due to the prescribed nature of the opening, games tend to be aggressive which leads to fierce middle game fighting.
Playing card
By the 11th century, playing cards were spreading throughout the Asian continent and later came into Egypt. The oldest surviving cards in the world are four fragments found in the Keir Collection and one in the Benaki Museum. They are dated to the 12th and 13th centuries (late Fatimid, Ayyubid, and early Mamluk periods).
History of games
One of the oldest known ball games in history is the Mesoamerican ballgame ("Ōllamaliztli" in Nahuatl). "Ōllamaliztli" was played as far back as 1,400 BC and had important religious significance for the mesoamerican peoples such as the Maya and Aztec. The game evolved over time but the main goal was to keep a solid rubber ball in play by striking it with various parts of the body or with tools such as rackets. The game may have served as a proxy for warfare and also had a major religious function. Formal ballgames were held as ritual events, often featuring human sacrifice, though it was also played for leisure by children and even women.
Uncle Wiggily (board game)
Uncle Wiggily Game is a track board game based on a character in a series of children's books by American writer Howard Roger Garis. The game is of the "racing" variety in the style of the European "Goose Game". Players advance along the track from Uncle Wiggily's Bungalow to Dr. Possum's House. There is no optimal strategy involved as play entirely rests upon a random drawing of the cards. The game was first published by Milton Bradley in 1916 and has seen several editions with minor modifications over the years. "Uncle Wiggily" remains one of the first and favorite games of childhood, and, with "Candy Land", is considered a classic juvenile American board game.
History of games
The history of games dates to the ancient human past. Games are an integral part of all cultures and are one of the oldest forms of human social interaction. Games are formalized expressions of play which allow people to go beyond immediate imagination and direct physical activity. Common features of games include uncertainty of outcome, agreed upon rules, competition, separate place and time, elements of fiction, elements of chance, prescribed goals and personal enjoyment.
Mak-yek
Mak-yek (, ) is a two-player abstract strategy board game played in Thailand (formerly called Siam) and Myanmar (formerly called Burma). Players move their pieces as in the rook in Chess and attempt to capture their opponent's pieces through custodian and intervention capture. The game may have been first described in literature by Captain James Low a writing contributor in the 1839 work "Asiatic Researches; or, Transactions of the Society, Instituted in Bengal, For Inquiring into The History, The Antiquities, The Arts and Sciences, and Literature of Asian, Second Part of the Twentieth Volume" in which he wrote chapter X "On Siamese Literature" and documented the game as Maak yék. Another early description of the game is by H.J.R. Murray in his 1913 work "A History of Chess", and the game was written as Maak-yek.