User:Bermicourt/Tables games/Todas Tablas

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Todas Tablas
Two women playing Todas Tablas
(Alfonso X, 1283)
GenresBoard game
Race game
Dice game
Players2
ChanceMedium (dice rolling)
SkillsStrategy, tactics, counting, probability
Related games: Backgammon, Irish, Toutes Tables

Todas Tablas was a Spanish tables game for two players that is recorded as early as 1283 by King Alfonso X of Castile. It is thought to be ancestral to Backgammon through its English equivalent Irish, as well as the French game, Toutes Tables.[1]

History[edit]

The earliest rules for Todas Tablas were published by King Alfonso X of Leon and Castile in 1283 in his renowned work, El Libro de los Juegos ("The Book of Games"). It is almost certainly the game generally known as "Tables" in the Middle Ages[2] and it appears ancestral or equivalent to both the Anglo-Scottish game of Irish as well as the once-popular French game of Toutes-Tables.[1]

Name[edit]

The name is variously translated as "All Tables,[3] "All the Tables"[4] or "All Tablemen"[5] The literature is split over whether this refers to the pieces being divided among all four "tables" i.e. quadrants of the tables board[a] or simply that all the 'tablemen' are in play.[b][c]

Equipment[edit]

The game requires a standard tables board, 15 pieces per player in different colours and two dice. No dice cups are specified by Alfonso.<ref name=Alfonso>Alfonso (1283), p

Starting Layout[edit]

Rules[edit]

The following rules are based on Alfonso (1283).

Footnotes[edit]

  1. ^ For example, Singman[4] and Macho et al.[6]
  2. ^ For example Golladay[3] and Parlett[5].
  3. ^ The confusion no doubt arises from the fact that tablas looks like "tables" but in fact is the Spanish word for "tablemen" or the pieces used to play the game.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b Forgeng, Johnson and Cram. (2003), p. 269.
  2. ^ Bell (1979), p. 42.
  3. ^ a b Golladay (2007), p. xx.
  4. ^ a b Singman (1999), p. 236.
  5. ^ a b Parlett (1999), p. 83.
  6. ^ Macho et al. (2012), pp. 99ff.

Literature[edit]

  • Alfonso X (1283). Libros de acedrex dados e tablas. Manuscript T.I.6. Biblioteca Real del Monasterio de El Escorial.
  • Bell, R.C. (1979).
  • * Willughby, Francis (2003). Forgeng, Jeff; Johnston, Dorothy; Cram, David (eds.). Francis Willughby's Book of Games. Farnham: Ashgate. ISBN 1 85928 460 4. (Critical edition of Willughby's volume containing descriptions of games and pastimes, c.1660-1672. Manuscript in the Middleton collection, University of Nottingham; document reference Mi LM 14)
  • Golladay, Sonja Musser (2007). Los Libros de Acedrex Dados e Tablas: Historical, Artistic and Metaphysical Dimension of Alfonso X's Book of Games. University of Arizona. (pdf).
  • Macho, José María Arribas, Alejandro Almazán Llorente, Beatriz Mañas Ramírez and Antonio Félix Vallejos Izquierdo (2012). Historia de la Probabilidad Y la Estadística Vi. Madrid: Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia. ISBN 9788436263633
  • Parlett, David (1999). The Oxford History of Board Games. Oxford: OUP. ISBN 9780192129987
  • Singman, Jeffrey L. (1999). Daily Life in Medieval Europe. Westport, CT: Greenwood. ISBN 0313302731
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