Perhaps the most authoritative work on the subject, this encyclopedic volume is a basic reference to board and table games from around the world. It provides the rules and methods of play for more than 180 different games: Ma-jong, Hazard, Wei-ch'i (go), Backgammon, Pachisi, and many others. Over 300 photographs and line drawings.
This encyclopedic volume provides the rules and methods of play for more than 180 different games: Ma-jong, Hazard, Wei-ch'i (Go), Backgammon, Pachisi, and many others. Over 300 photographs and line drawings.
For thousands of years, people have been planning attacks, captures, chases, and conquests - on a variety of different boards designed for an astonishing diversity of games. Today the compelling mix of strategy, skill, and chance is as strong as ever; new board games are invented almost daily,while the perennial favourites continue to attract new devotees and reveal new possibilities. The Oxford History of Board Games investigates the principles of board games throughout the ages and across the world, exploring the fascinating similarities and differences that give each its unique appeal, and drawing out the significance of game-playing as a central part of human experience - asvital to a culture as its music, dance, and tales. Beautifully illustrated and with diagrams to show the finer points of the games, this is a fascinating and accessible guide to a richly rewarding subject. In his trade-mark accessible, entertaining style, David Parlett looks at the different families of games: games based on configuration or connection, races or chases, wars or hunts, capture or blockade. He focuses mainly on traditional games, the folk entertainments that have grown up organicallythrough the centuries, and which exhibit endless local variations, although he discusses also the commercial products that have tried, with varying degrees of success, to match their astonishing popularity. This is not primarily a how-to book, although the rules and strategies of certain games are discussed in detail, neither does it offer sure-fire tips for success, although with a fuller understanding of a game the reader will undoubtedly become a better-informed, if not better, player. Rather, itis an affectionate and authoritative survey of one of the most familiar parts of our cultural history, which has until now been inexplicably neglected.
“[A] timely book . . . a wonderfully entertaining trip around the board, through 4,000 years of game history.” —The Wall Street Journal Board games have been with us even longer than the written word. But what is it about this pastime that continues to captivate us well into the age of smartphones and instant gratification? In It’s All a Game, Tristan Donovan, British journalist and author of Replay: The History of Video Games, opens the box on the incredible and often surprising history and psychology of board games. He traces the evolution of the game across cultures, time periods, and continents, from the paranoid Chicago toy genius behind classics like Operation and Mouse Trap, to the role of Monopoly in helping prisoners of war escape the Nazis, and even the scientific use of board games today to teach artificial intelligence how to reason and how to win. With these compelling stories and characters, Donovan ultimately reveals why board games—from chess to Monopoly to Risk and more—have captured hearts and minds all over the world for generations. “Splendid . . . A quick and breezy read, it doesn’t just tell the fascinating stories of the (often struggling) individuals who created our favorite games. It also manages to convey the entire sweep of board game history, from the earliest forms of checkers to modern-day surprise hits like Settlers of Catan.” —Mashable “Artfully weaves together culture, business, and ways games impact society.” —Booklist “A fascinating and insightful discussion not only of games past, but the socioeconomic and historical factors that contributed to their popularity.” —Chicago Review of Books
The printed board game reached new heights of beauty and ingenuity during the nineteenth century, covering almost every conceivable theme, from geography or history to contemporary crazes. Some relied on dice or a numbered spinning top called a teetotum, others were meant for gambling, and still more were "mind games" requiring serious thought. They all appear in this lavish book, which displays elaborately designed boards and traces their development through time.
This book presents novel and interesting ways of teaching archaeological concepts and processes to college and university students. Seeking alternatives to the formal lecture format, the various contributions seek better ways of communicating the complexities of human behavior and of engaging students in active learning about the past. This collection of imaginative exercises designed by 20 master instructors on three continents includes role-playing, games, simulations, activities, and performance, all designed to teach archaeological concepts in interesting and engaging ways.
Two books, bound together in a single volume, ground novices in fundamentals and lead them to mastery of 80 different tricks involving cards, coins, matches, and other articles. 89 illustrations.
Jan Huizinga and Roger Caillois have already taught us to realize how important games and play have been for pre-modern civilization. Recent research has begun to acknowledge the fundamental importance of these aspects in cultural, religious, philosophical, and literary terms. This volume expands on the traditional approach still very much focused on the materiality of game (toys, cards, dice, falcons, dolls, etc.) and acknowledges that game constituted also a form of coming to terms with human existence in an unstable and volatile world determined by universal randomness and fortune. Whether considering blessings or horse fighting, falconry or card games, playing with dice or dolls, we can gain a much deeper understanding of medieval and early modern society when we consider how people pursued pleasure and how they structured their leisure time. The contributions examine a wide gamut of approaches to pleasure, considering health issues, eroticism, tournaments, playing music, reading and listening, drinking alcohol, gambling and throwing dice. This large issue was also relevant, of course, in non-Christian societies, and constitutes a critical concern both for the past and the present because we are all homines ludentes.
This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
