great video as always, love whenever you delve into games from nations long past, people always focus on the wars, kings and empires of history, and forget that people played games for as long as civilization was a thing
I find it interesting that the alquerque pattern shows up so much. Just like it’s interesting that the bear game from Rome uses almost the same board for watermelon chess.
'Cause people. (There are books on the subject.) It's the same with 9-hole games to make patterns, the use of pawns to represent people and animals, and common "binary randomizers" other than sticks. Anthropologists say it's human nature, coupled with the restrictions of 2-dimensional surfaces to play on. Since the dawn of husbandry the predators have tried to eat the herds. (I have been surprised to not find an ancient "shepherd versus prey" game wherein the human tries to defend its herd.) Likewise the "hunt" games are ubiquitous. It's a similar situation with kicking and throwing and hitting objects at targets and goals. Everywhere humans can be found there is some form of game like that. 'Cause people.
Expat in Chile here. This was a pleasant surprise! BTW it's pronounced "MAH - POO - CHAY".
Thanks for the language lesson. Apologies to all the Mapuche people! Thanks for watching.
great video as always, love whenever you delve into games from nations long past, people always focus on the wars, kings and empires of history, and forget that people played games for as long as civilization was a thing
I find it interesting that the alquerque pattern shows up so much. Just like it’s interesting that the bear game from Rome uses almost the same board for watermelon chess.
There is a Tibenham game with Goats and a Leopard.
How come these games are all over the world,
as well as stick dice??
'Cause people. (There are books on the subject.) It's the same with 9-hole games to make patterns, the use of pawns to represent people and animals, and common "binary randomizers" other than sticks. Anthropologists say it's human nature, coupled with the restrictions of 2-dimensional surfaces to play on. Since the dawn of husbandry the predators have tried to eat the herds. (I have been surprised to not find an ancient "shepherd versus prey" game wherein the human tries to defend its herd.) Likewise the "hunt" games are ubiquitous. It's a similar situation with kicking and throwing and hitting objects at targets and goals. Everywhere humans can be found there is some form of game like that. 'Cause people.
😁👍