The Online Guide to Traditional Games
Board Games
- History and Useful Information -
I have attempted to include on this page the histories of any ancient board game that still has major derivatives which are played today. 'Ancient' is used rather loosely in that I mean board games with histories older than around 1500 AD.
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The Game of Twenty Squares (The Royal Game of Ur) |
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The sublime game of Go (Wei Qi) |
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| The Chess Family (International Chess, Chinese Chess, Shogi) |  |
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The Tafl family (Tablut + Fox and Geese) |
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Nine Men's Morris (Mill, Merels) |
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The Alquerque Family (Draughts, Checkers, Fanorona) |
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Pachisi, the National Game of Indiai (Parcheesi, Ludo) |
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| The Mystical game of Moksha-Patamu (Snakes and Ladders) |  |
| Halma was invented about 1880 and Chinese Checkers is just a modern Western version of Halma popular in the 1920's. (But rules were made to be broken). |  |
Reversi, played on a Draughts board was invented in 1888.
Links
Buy a rather nice Games Compendium and other quality board games from Masters Games.
Roman Board Games An excellent site by Wladyslaw Jan Kowalski
Association of Game and Puzzle Collectors (formerly the American Game Collectors Association).
Ancient Board Games and the Nabataeans regarding a mysterious game found at the ancient city of Petra.
jm at tradgames.org.uk