Board Games

Alquerque: The Moorish Game That Became Checkers

Ancient Board Games, Medieval European Games, Persian & Islamic Games, Strategy & Tactics /

In 1283, a team of scribes working for King Alfonso X of Castile finished a manuscript that game historians have been mining ever since: the Libro de los juegos, the Book of Games. Most of its hundred or so illuminated pages belong to chess. But tucked between the chess problems and the dice games sit […]

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Yut Nori: Korea’s New Year Race Game of Sticks and Horses

Ancient Board Games, Asian Strategy Games /

On the morning of Seollal, the Korean Lunar New Year, the game comes out before the food does. Four wooden sticks clatter onto a mat, someone shouts “Mo!”, and four generations of one family start arguing about whether to stack their pieces or split them. The game is Yut Nori (윷놀이), and Koreans have been

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