Did the Anglo-Saxons Play Games of Chance? Some Thoughts on Old English Board Games
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8888092 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Ian Payne (University of Leicester, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2006 |
| Volume | 86 |
| Pages | 330-345 |
| Publication date | 2006-09-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Antiquaries Journal (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0003-5815 • E-ISSN: 1758-5309 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0003581500000184 |
| OpenAlex | W1990234883 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 8 |
H J R Murray, the distinguished board games historian, stated categorically in 1952 that the popular Germanic game of tæfl ( more specifically referred to in a ninth- to twelfth-century Norse context as hnefatafl), a game entirely of skill, was the only board game played in Anglo-Saxon England. But Old English literary evidence might pose a challenge to Murray's thesis, and could be taken to suggest that the English also played games of chance (perhaps even tabula, an ancestor of backgammon) in the first millennium AD
Archaeology · Art · Context (archaeology · Literature · Ninth · Old English · Classics · Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies · History · Linguistics and language evolution · Medieval Literature and History
| Highly cited | No |
|---|