Talk:Backgammon/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Backgammon by region

See discussion at Talk:Tables game#Restructuring of sections and insertion of non-English or specialist material

Onceinawhile (talk) 14:07, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Cultural significance

@Elias Ziade, Nehme1499, Makeandtoss, Al Ameer son, Nableezy, and JJNito197: I realize it is presumptuous but I figured that you may all have played this game before.

I just added the "cultural significance" section to this article after a few days of discussion, and wondered if you had any thoughts on the drafting and if it is consistent with your experiences. Onceinawhile (talk) 21:15, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I have no experience playing this game (as much as I think it looks interesting). Nehme₁₄₉₉ 21:49, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Hello Onceinawhile, yes I have played this game and yes I do have antiquated sets at home sitting around! Your edits summarise it perfectly with the use of Eastern Mediterranean which is becoming more and more standard in discourse. Kind regards JJNito197 (talk)

Thank you for contributing this section about backgammon's role in ME heritage. Played shaish baish once or twice with cousins in Palestine many years ago and even remember my uncles nearly coming to blows over a game apparently gone wrong. Personally don't know much about it, but ping me again when you have something on East Med card games ;) Al Ameer (talk) 17:59, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

@Al Ameer son: – East Med card games, eh – have you ever played Tunj? Wonderful game.

Tawleh is a huge cultural thing in my family. Like you said, and like JJNito997 said, every member of my family has multiple backgammon sets and it's great for bonding but also sometimes the exact opposite….

Onceinawhile (talk) 20:01, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

Do you mean Tawleh using standard Backgammon rules as in this article, or those for Tavla here or maybe Tawulah here or another variation such as Shesh Besh? I'm interested in all these variations, who plays them and where. Bermicourt (talk) 15:40, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

I personally think that bkgm website is making stuff up. Noone uses those names to refer to such specific nuanced differences. Tawleh/Tavla/Tawulah/Tabli are entirely generic terms. As to the rules my cultural circle uses, it is standard setup, definitely with a doubling cube (much less fun without), gammon is double points and backgammon is quadruple, the winner of the opening roll has to play those dice, a player cannot bear off a lower number than the die roll unless nothing higher, no rules about not hitting-and-running in home territory.

As I said earlier, I have played in many countries in the region and noone has ever said “oh in Turkey we don’t use the doubling dice” or “no hit and run in home”. Maybe different families play different nuances, but the bkgm website’s idea that there are minor national variations on standard modern backgammon seems unfounded. Onceinawhile (talk) 16:42, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Backgammon, like bridge, is now an international game and obviously you have enjoyed playing it in many countries around the Middle East region. However, it seems unlikely that a major American backgammon site would just make rules up for different regional games. Moreover, there are other weighty sources which suggest that, even if some of the names are being used pars pro toto to refer to backgammon, they are or were games in their own right. I think it does other cultures an injustice to claim that they're simply playing a game of Western invention and giving it their own name. That denies their history, their inventiveness and culture which, in terms of tables games, goes back way before backgammon appeared on the scene as a gambler's version of Irish. So for example, Murray (1952) and Bell (1975) have different rules for Tawula(h); there are online sites, including an academic one, with different rules for Nard and Nardshir; Parlett (1999) has different rules for Tavli; Brandreth (1981) distinguishes Plakoto and Russian Backgammon and so on. Sfetcu (2014) describes four main tables games played in the Middle East – Ifranjiah or Takhte Nard is MB, Shesh Besh, Mahbusa and Maghribiyya - as well as Short and Long Nard, Tavli, Gul Bara and Tabla. Some of these games don't even play in the same direction as backgammon and several have different starting layouts. What we need to do is cut through the fog, created by a tendency by those who have only heard the modern Western game to refer to every tables game as "backgammon" or the equivalent in other languages, and discern from WP:RS how precisely these non-backgammon games are actually played, what they are properly called and, if we can, uncover something of the history and culture surrounding them. I'm sure that would unveil a very rich and varied picture. Bermicourt (talk) 18:57, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

The bkgm website looks to me like a personal website which grew over three decades. Its author, Tom Keith, does not appear to have been published in ony other media. So I do not think it adheres to WP:RS.

I am sure the games and rules that Tom Keith describe exist, but (a) not in a standardized or national form, and (b) the table-cognate names he has given them are nonsensical for such specific nuances.

Ifranjiah / Franjieh just means “Frankish” or “Western”, so by definition it is MB.

Shesh besh just means 6-5, and so is as generic a name as Tawla (table).

I believe the sources you list are Western games specialists rather than specialists of the specific region we are discussing. I am sure their descriptions of the various game rules are factual, the problem is just very poor labelling. Generic names should not be used to refer to very specific sets of rules. Onceinawhile (talk) 20:14, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Ifranjiah / Franjieh just means “Frankish” or “Western”. Yes, Sfetcu makes that clear. I was summarising. Likewise Short Nard is a local name for MB. Have you tracked down any "specialists of the specific region" who understand and have described these games in any detail? Most of the sources I've seen say things like "they play Tabla (backgammon) with a passion" which as we agree does not mean they are playing either MB or a specific variant. It just tells us they like playing a tables game of some sort. At least a games specialist knows what to look for. Also be careful about dismissing sources because the the authors aren't natives. I research German and Austria games but I'm not from that part of the world. That hasn't stopped me uncovering historical and modern cultural and gaming information that most Germans, even the locals, weren't aware of. And some of my British colleagues have published groundbreaking information on games across the whole of Europe; to wit Dummett's classic work on Tarot games which originated in Italy and spread across the continent.

Your final point hits the nail squarely on the head. People have been using the name backgammon or its native equivalents to refer to games that are not backgammon. That's the root of the problem. Bermicourt (talk) 20:48, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

I agree with everything you write above. I would never judge a scholar on whether they are native or not, but language is relevant in regional studies, and it certainly helps on the labelling side.

By the way, Maghribiyya (one of the names on Sfetcu’s list) literally means “Western” as well, but is usually used to mean “from the Maghreb” (i.e. the Western part of the Arabic speaking world).

Onceinawhile (talk) 20:54, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Confusion with rest of tables family

The article appears to conflate the game of Backgammon with most if not all the other games of the Tables family, tending to describe them as 'variants' of Backgammon. In fact, Backgammon is a 'Johnny-come-lately' in the history of Tables games having 'only' been around for the last 500 of the family's 5000 year old history. So strictly speaking Backgammon is a descendant of Tabula and Tables and most of the other games are cousins or relatives, not variants, of Backgammon. Bermicourt (talk) 21:46, 8 November 2021 (UTC)

OK, I'll bite. Do you have reliable sources for this? Also, do we have articles, in English Wikipedia, that describe the "cousins or relatives" this way? Bruce leverett (talk) 01:57, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

Yes, I'm gathering them in. The problem is that the word 'backgammon' is misused by many writers, including lexicographers, to refer to any game played with a multiple-point or box formatted board. But there are many different games played on a backgammon board. Moreover, we don't find board game rules much before the 17th century and the earliest reference to "backgammon" itself appears to be c. 1646, so the claim that anyone played it 5,000 years ago or even 550 years ago, is guesswork or imprecise use of language. The only early rules we seem to have are for tabula; they are incomplete, but it's clearly not the same as backgammon.

Fiske is one of the few to have researched this and I'm transcribing his work, but I'm also waiting for other sources to come in: Murray, Parlett and Bell for a start. On English Wiki, the main article that should cover this is Tables (board game family) and it doesn't do a bad job, but its history section starts well and then peters out. It doesn't really describe what we know of the history and relationship (tenuous or strong) between tabula, nard, tables and backgammon. Bermicourt (talk) 17:30, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

Indeed, I was wondering if all these archaeological discoveries were really backgammon. There is the same problem with chess: when someone finds a square board or cute miniature sculptures of elephants, they are eager to proclaim that it's chess; but written descriptions that indicate rules close to those of chess only go back to about 700 AD.

Plus, if you have discovered some artifacts that are 5,000 years old, you don't necessarily have the oldest artifacts; you just have the oldest that have been discovered so far.

These considerations don't stop the nationalist gnomes from endlessly trying to tweak the Backgammon and Chess articles to say that their nation invented the game. Bruce leverett (talk) 19:39, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

Totally agree. A good example is the well-preserved board found in the Mary Rose (pictured) which the museum has labelled "Backgammon Set". The Mary Rose sank about 100 years before the first recorded mention of backgammon and, frankly, no one knows what games were played on it. What can be said with accuracy is that it is a "tables set" because the board is of a type know to have been used for "games at tables" which had been played in England since around 1200 and continues to be mentioned until 1670. Of course it looks like a backgammon set because backgammon is played on a modern tables board.

Fiske argues that tables was probably backgammon's direct ancestor (and certainly not tabula as that article claims). I'm not aware of any known rules for tables and, indeed, it seems to have spawned several variants anyway, so we can't automatically equate tables and backgammon. Bermicourt (talk) 20:42, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

Cram & Forgeng, in their landmark commentary on Francis Willughby's Book of Games say of Backgammon that "this English game appears to have been an early 17th-century innovation, combining the initial set-up of Irish with the rule in some other Tables games, such as Doublets, by which a roll of doubles was played twice or entitled the player to an extra turn." Irish, they add, "flourished in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; thereafter it seems to have given way to its faster paced derivative Backgammon. In spite of the name, it represented one of the most international forms of Tables, corresponding to Spanish Todas Tablas (in Alfonso X's treatise), French Toutes Tables, Italian Tavole Reale and many Asian forms of the game." Cram & Forgeng, in turn, cite Alfonso X (1941: 322-5 [fol. 77]), Cotton (1930: 75–6), Holme (2001: iii.16.2.29a-b.) and Murray (1952: 120, 122). This is the sort of detail we need. I have a translation of Alfonso, but don't yet have access to the others. Bermicourt (talk) 19:42, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

An additional suggestion is to also clarify, perhaps at the beginning of the article, somewhere in the first sentence, the relation of what is referred to in the article as "Backgammon" and what is generally the "Tables family" as there isn't any direct reference to Backgammon from 5,000 years ago, and the board games that are being referenced as "Tables family" look very different (i.e., the Royal Game of Ur).

The introduction to the History section suffers from the same lack of clarity. Later on in the History section, the article reads "The history of tables games can be traced back nearly 5,000 years to archaeological discoveries in the Jiroft culture, of Persia,  the world's oldest game set of board, counters and dice having been discovered in the region." I believe that this is a contested claim without a good source. None of the references cited actually support this claim. This should be modified to say that there is either (A) a claim that a potential early version of a game from the Tables family, perhaps a distant precursor of Backgammon, was found in the Jiroft cultural area, but has yet to be properly dated or (B) mention what was found during various expeditions and place it, time-wise, to the late Bronze age. The game board that was found actually looks like a Royal Game of Ur knock-off. Link: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4645795/ Ironically enough, the dice that were included in the original press release article, and shown in the link, are a pair of Roman D6, and most definitely not the ones found with the game board, so some argue that the claim that the excavation in the early 2000s discovered the oldest "Backgammon" game is a little suspicious. Highest Voltage (talk) 08:02, 9 June 2022 (UTC)

I added a history section with reference to a page of Shahname that depicts people playing backgammon (Nard) during Sassanid dynasty. So on that basis, the earliest reference to Nard is not 17th century in Europe! Shayan Morty (talk) 12:07, 27 July 2022 (UTC)

@Shayan Morty: No one would claim that the earliest reference to Nard is 17th-century Europe, nor does this article. The problem seems to be the common (but incorrect) assumption that "Nard"="Backgammon". This is not true (or at least not necessarily true); each is just one of the many related games all falling under the family name "Tables". And, yes, Nard is very clearly much older than Backgammon. But it is also possible that "Nard" itself can mean more than one thing, leading to additional confusion: as David Parlett notes both that "Nard as described in the Alfonso MS of 1283 is recognizably ancestral Backgammon, but in the absence of earlier rules one can only assume that it was substantially similar" (2018: 74) -- but also that "[t]he identity of modern Nard with Backgammon does not help, as the Iranian game may represent a back-borrowing." (2018: 75, emphasis mine). Meaning that the game many play today as "Nard" may literally be "Backgammon"; however the historical game of Nard has a distinct history from Backgammon. Phil wink (talk) 18:30, 27 July 2022 (UTC)

With the help of additional sources, I hope I've now unravelled this. Most of the history section has been transferred to Tables game, since it was almost entirely about tables games before Backgammon appeared on the scene. However, I've expanded the history of Backgammon itself so it is now more extensive here than at the Tables game article, as it should be. Clearly more work is needed on both, but hopefully the two articles are now better structured and balanced and can be more easily expanded. Bermicourt (talk) 20:30, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Todas Tablas was Arabic?

I can find no sources that describe the game as "Arabic" but several call it "Spanish". If El Libro dos Juegos was a translation from Arabic, that can be said and cited separately. while some sources may say this, others only say it was 'derived' not 'translated' and Alfonso was known for putting his own stamp on the work. Also even if the work was translated from an Arabic document (and it would be great to identify which one), that doesn't define all the games therein as Arabic. The Arabic source may have been describing all known games. One source says the book is influenced by Moorish culture, so the games may have been Spanish Moorish, not Arabic. But as you say, the key is to reflect the WP:RS. Bermicourt (talk) 21:31, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

I am following the description at our article Libro de los Juegos. It was one of many books produced by the Toledo School of Translators. That School was a key location for the start of the Renaissance, as described at Islamic world contributions to Medieval Europe. Much of the high culture of the Roman Empire went East first, and then found its way back to Western Europe via Spain. This game would have passed through the same route. Onceinawhile (talk) 22:39, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

• @Bermicourt and Onceinawhile: I've just entered a skeptical red flag here: Talk:Libro_de_los_Juegos#Is_the_Libro_really_just_a_translation?. Cheers. Phil wink (talk) 16:13, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Also you write “may have been Spanish Moorish, not Arabic”. Moors were Arabs. Arab simply means “speaker of Arabic”. Onceinawhile (talk) 22:43, 25 September 2022 (UTC)

It's a fair point, but the truth is that the precise route by which tables games reached Western Europe has yet to be uncovered, viz Parlett (1999): "What remains unclear is whether European Tables is better regarded as a continuation of [Roman] Tabula or as an import from Nard-playing Islam, or how the two might be combined. Fiske seems to ascribe more to Nard than to Tabula, yet all his evidence rather favours a continuation from Tabula" and he goes on to say that modern Nard as played in Iran may represent a back-borrowing.

Of course, Moors were Arabs but "Moorish culture" refers to those who occupied the Iberian Peninsula. The point is that we don't have the original manuscripts and therefore we don't know if they had compiled games played by Moors, by all people living in Spain, by the Arab world or by their then known world. Nor do we know the precise relationship between the ancient games, Roman Tabula, Middle Eastern Nard and European Tables. It's a rich area for future research. Bermicourt (talk) 07:33, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

My view is that Nard and Roman Tabula games merged in the East Med and North Africa, and trying to delineate between them will be futile research. The East Med was the inheritor of much of Roman culture, and there it mixed with Persian culture, subsequently passing through North Africa into Spain via the trade routes of the early Arab empires. Large areas have "sprachbunds" in language - basically a spectrum - and the same spectrum holds in entertainment culture.

Onceinawhile (talk) 12:05, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

That may well be the case. Unfortunately there are large gaps in the literature and references to the name of any game are fraught with difficulty e.g. the same name being used for different games or different names for the same game. I've just discovered on a field trip that the Black Forest card games of Viersche and Hundert in that region are one and the same; but Hundert is not the same as Hundertspiel although in both cases there was a point target of 100. Bermicourt (talk) 13:00, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Brueghel's painting of 'backgammon'

I've just removed the following text recently added by an unregistered user:

However, in Peter Bruegel’s painting ‘The Triumph of Death’ which depicted the aftermath of the ‘black death’ has, on the bottom right corner, a backgammon set. On the board there is a die. Bruegel died in 1569 which insinuates the date of the current rules to backgammon cannot be precisely determined. Link to ‘The Triumph of Death’ painting is below:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b3/The_Triumph_of_Death_by_Pieter_Bruegel_the_Elder.jpg/1920px-The_Triumph_of_Death_by_Pieter_Bruegel_the_Elder.jpg

This is yet another example of any tables board in history being assumed to be used for the game of backgammon. The board used for playing backgammon is nothing more than the standard tables board used for playing countless other games now and historically. We simply cannot tell from a picture of a 24-pointed board, some counters and dice what game was actually being played. We know fairly precisely from English sources, however, when the game of Backgammon appeared and that it was a development of the game of Irish, all of which is described in the text. Bermicourt (talk) 07:08, 12 September 2022 (UTC)

How old is backgammon?

I have little doubt that the historical exposition in the article is correct, or largely so. However, I think we could address the misconception that backgammon is the oldest game in the world in a better way. We have, as the first sentence after the lead,

Contrary to popular belief, backgammon is not the oldest board game in the world, nor are all tables games variants of backgammon.

I think this might be better:

Tables boards and pieces, resembling those of modern backgammon, can be documented nearly 5000 years back; rules broadly resembling those of backgammon can be dated 1500 years back, and the name "backgammon" nearly 400 years back. The common misconception that backgammon is among the oldest board games in the world thus stems from confusing the relatively modern game of backgammon with the entire tables family, which is indeed ancient.

Also, I think this might go in the lead, insted of into the history section. But I'd like to hear others' opinions before I boldly make the edit!--Nø (talk) 16:57, 12 September 2022 (UTC)

To be fair, this is currently pretty clearly laid out in the lead:

Backgammon is the most widespread member of the large family of tables games, a type of board game played with counters and dice on tables boards. This family of games dates back nearly 5,000 years to Mesopotamia and Persia, whereas the earliest record of backgammon itself dates to the 17th century England; being descended from the 16th-century game of Irish.

...though there is nothing wrong with duplicating information between the lead and a section (in fact, it's recommended). Probably a good reason for repeating this (or text like it) twice is that it would be indelicate to repeat it five times! Another possibility might be to address the nomenclature problem even more head-on with something to the effect of: "Because of its global popularity, the name "backgammon" has sometimes been applied to similar but distinct games such as Tavli, Nard... [insert whatever games you think are most significant misnomers], but here "backgammon" refers strictly to the 17th-century English game and its subsequent developments." This is a little self-referential, which is generally frowned upon in Wikipedia, but maybe desperate times call for desperate measures? Cheers. Phil wink (talk) 18:27, 12 September 2022 (UTC)

It's odd, the editor who mentioned the Bruegel painting seemed to understand what we were saying, but he plowed right past it anyway, and he is probably not the only one. When people see that 24-pointed board, they want to jump to the conclusion that the game was the game they know, as if it were a logical inference. Is there anything we can say that will discourage them from doing that? Bruce leverett (talk) 01:16, 13 September 2022 (UTC)

I don't have a problem either with the point being re-emphasised in the history section and I think Nø's summary isn't too wide of the mark. The only difficulty is finding a source that also summarises it so succinctly. It may need several citations; one covering each point made.Bermicourt (talk) 15:12, 13 September 2022 (UTC)

OK, so I tried something today (in the lead), and it was reverted @Bermicourt: @Phil wink:. I really think we must address head-on the question of what we mean when we deny that backgammon is 5000 years old (but accept it is 400 years). For most modern players, "backgammon" is

1. the equipment, which is in broad terms 5000 years old
2. the general nature of the gameplay, which is likely just as old, but sources that state the rules clearly enough to compare are more recent (my bid was Nard, 1500 years, but perhaps I got that wrong).
3. the name, which is 400 years (as baggammon), though the rules were a bit different (no doubling cube, for one thing)
4. the exact rules, with or without the doubling cube
5. and finally (if not included in the previous point), the doubling cube.

Also, I think we should be more careful defining "tables games" in the first sentence, where we have:

Backgammon is the most widespread member of the large family of tables games, a type of board game played with counters and dice on tables boards

Here, I think we should be clear that ANY game played with such equipment is included. Otherwise, we inadvertently may give the impression the 5000 years old game was, in fact, essentially backgammon, but afaik all we really know is that the equipment looks very similar.--Nø (talk) 19:22, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Royal Game of Ur

Those are good points. We certainly don't want to add to the confusion that already exists out there. A few initial comments:

The equipment used in ancient games was quite different. For example, see the image of the Royal Game of Ur (right) which is about 3,500 years old. These are the oldest for which we have rules (noting Phil's "nerdy tangent" caveat in the box below, but the reconstruction is based on a description).

Parlett describes tables games as:

• Played by two players and hence...
• ...Bilaterally symmetrical
• Multiplex games i.e. players have a large number of pieces
• Played on a rectangular board with players sitting on the long sides
• Played on a board with four quarters known as tables, hence the name "tables game"

Quite obviously the ancient race games don't fit all these criteria which is why he describes them as 'forerunners' of the tables games. The earliest true tables game we know of appears to be Tabula, although Parlett includes it under forerunners along with Nard(shir).

Parlett classifies later tables games into "games without movement", "games of contrary movement" (e.g. Backgammon) and "games of parallel movement". I've summarised his classification at tables game, where I've also tried to summarise the history.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to call the game known historically as Backgammon by that name even though modern Western Backgammon (MWB) introduced key changes: the gammon, the backgammon, the bar and the doubling cube. If we don't call the game Backgammon, we will have to introduce a new name which is WP:OR. However, there's no reason why we can't talk about historical or 17th/18th/19th/20th century or MWB to make the distinction. Backgammon Galore has a variant called "Old English Backgammon" which looks like an intermediate version and Parlett describes "traditional English Backgammon" which appears similar.

To a newcomer, many of the tables games played today look very similar to Backgammon, differing in only a few points. However, a single rule change (e.g. direction of play or whether blots are hit or pinned or a different starting layout) can affect the tactics considerably. Also a game is not just defined by its mechanics but its culture and I think it's good to refer to them by their native name unless they are identical with MWB.

Historically it's even more important to separate out the naming confusion where we can. Fiske did great work on this in the early 20th century, but more has since been discovered.

I have captured what little is known of Nard at that article; it's not the same as MWB, but Parlett calls it Proto-Backgammon which seems reasonable.

I hope that helps. Bermicourt (talk) 21:04, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

P.S. Fiske came up with 3 periods of [tables] development to which Parlett added a (preceding) fourth:

• Grammai and other classical games including Tabula (the 'forerunners', but they include at least one tables game proper)
• Nard: from its invention or earliest appearance in south-west Asia prior to the 9th century AD
• Tables: the European game in all its variations from around the turn of the first millenium
• Backgammon, Trictrac, and other sophisticated games from the 15th century onwards.

So Nard is very important in the development. We just have to remember that it underwent its own changes so e.g. modern Nard is not the same as Ur-Nard. Fiske's sequence is quite helpful and I may see if I can incorporate it at the tables game article and possibly here.Bermicourt (talk) 07:26, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

Nerdy tangent on earliest rules

I'll try at some point to respond to some of the other issues raised. Now, I'll just mention as a sidebar that I assume the earliest identifiable tables game (that is, the earliest game for which we have a decent understanding of the rules of play) to be "Zeno's game" -- that is, the game allegedly played by the Eastern Roman Emperor Zeno (presumably between 474 and 491 CE) and described (poetically but in some detail) by Agathias in the last half of the 6th century CE. The broadly-favored interpretation of Becq de Fouquières has been accepted by R. G. Austin and somewhat clarified by Ulrich Schädler. Becq de Fouquières, L. (Louis) (1873) [1869]. Les Jeux des Anciens (2nd ed.). Paris: Didier. Austin, Roland G. (1934). "Zeno's game of τάβλη (A.P. ix. 482)". The Journal of Hellenic Studies. 54 (2): 202–205. doi:10.2307/626864. ISSN 2041-4099. JSTOR 626864. Schädler, Ulrich (1995). "XII Scripta, Alea, Tabula—New Evidence for the Roman History of 'Backgammon'". In de Voogt, Alexander J. (ed.). New Approaches to Board Games Research: Asian Origins and Future Perspectives. Leiden: International Institute for Asian Studies. pp. 73–98. ISBN 90-74917-10-0. ...unless you count Finkel's reconstruction of the Game of Twenty Squares which is a) more tenuously related to the tables family, and b) despite what it says on the tin, from the 2nd century BCE and certainly not identical to what was actually played in Ur. Finkel, Irving (2007). "On the Rules for the Royal Game of Ur". In Finkel, Irving (ed.). Ancient Board Games in Perspective. London: British Museum Press. pp. 16–32. ISBN 978-0-7141-1153-7. Apologies for the tangent. Cheers. Phil wink (talk) 21:10, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

I support Nø's proposal above. It jars with me that we glibly state that "backgammon itself" is a modern English game, when it is not as simple as that. I respect Bermicourt's approach with his delineation of tables games vs backgammon, but disagree with how extreme he proposes to be with his definition of what defines backgammon. I play monopoly and scrabble at home with a few "unofficial" rules, that doesn't mean they are different games. The scholarship is unsure re how similar the Mediterranean / Middle Eastern ancestors of the English standard are, so we must follow that - i.e. recognize in the lead that the medieval game MIGHT have been the same game to all intents and purposes, and point out - as Nø does - that the "general nature of the gameplay" definitely pre-dates the English standard.

I also like Phil's point re the earliest identified table game, and hope he adds it into the Tables game article. Onceinawhile (talk) 07:25, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

Just to be clear; I'm only recommending that the game called Backgammon since 1635 both in WP:RS and in common usage is what we call Backgammon on Wikipedia. I hope we can all agree on that. I'm also recommending that other forms of tables game that have different rules and a different name in their own culture are called by that name and not labelled "Backgammon" after some newspaper reporter or bloggist who has no idea that there is anything else. That also lines up with WP:RS including Fiske, Bell, Murray, Parlett and others. So my definition is not "extreme" nor is it "mine"; it's simply reflecting the mainstream of scholarship. From a practical point of view, it's also helpful to use the native names for games with rules that are different from MWB. It's also respectful of those cultures, not imposing a rigid Anglo-American view of the world on what is a rich and nuanced field.

Nowhere can I see the statement that "Backgammon itself is a modern English game". It is true, however, that Backgammon is a traditional English game that subsequently spread abroad. It took off in America, where it was subsequently modified into MWB.

Phil's point is now captured at the tables game article. Bermicourt (talk) 13:05, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing up respect for other cultures. Your proposed approach disrespects those cultures by excising them from the main article on the topic, appropriating both the history and the present of the game. Per WP:OTHERNAMES, WP:COMMONNAME and WP:WORLDVIEW, what matters is simply what the game is called in English. I realize there is no such intent, but the extremely narrow manner in which you propose to define what is "Backgammon" has that effect. Your claim that it lines up with Fiske, Bell, Murray and Parlett is not true - they delineate major differences like pinning instead of hitting, or different starting positions.

Perhaps the most egregious example of the extremity of your proposed definition that I have seen so far is an insistence that if the game doesn't include the doubling cube then it isn't backgammon. This is despite the fact that the doubling cube itself was only invented in the 1920s. So it is apparently OK to call it backgammon between 1646 and 1920 so long as the game was being played in the Western world, but not when it is played in other regions. Or perhaps we should change the article to say that Backgammon was invented in the 1920s? The same is true of the initial-dice-roll conventions, or minor differences in scoring - these were most certainly not standardized in 1646.

Onceinawhile (talk) 13:34, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

National game in countries of the Eastern Med

The lede states that:

It is considered the national game in many countries of the Eastern Mediterranean: Egypt, Turkey, Cyprus, Syria, Israel, Palestine, Lebanon and Greece.

However, a quick glance at the sources shows that several have fallen into the trap of equating backgammon with any other locally popular tables game. For example:

• Greece: the article is entitled "All you need to know about Tavli..." and goes on to describe 3 different tables games (Portes, Plakoto and Fevga) which do not have the same rules as backgammon. In fact it even says "Portes - most similar to Western backgammon", implying that none of them are the same game. It goes on to describe the "general differences" between the Greek games and "western style" backgammon. So the article does not support the assertion.
• Turkey: the article makes the usual mistake of equating Tavla with Backgammon, but the Tables article explains the main differences and the fact that there are "many variants".
• Cyprus: the source makes the mistake of equating Tavli with Backgammon.

Unless sources can be found that demonstrate that Backgammon, and not a differently played game with a different name, is actually the national game of these countries, my proposal is to remove the sentence from here and, where the source is not conflating different games, use it at the tables game article, e.g. the Greek source would work well there. Bermicourt (talk) 19:58, 27 July 2022 (UTC)

References

Agree... the perennial problem of too many things uncritically being called "Backgammon". Unless there is already such language in the current article, it might not be amiss to mention something to the effect of "because of the global fame of Backgammon, it has been frequently and imprecisely use as an English equivalent word for a variety of distinct forms of Tables ... " blah blah. You'll do better than me. Phil wink (talk) 20:22, 27 July 2022 (UTC)

Hi @Phil wink: your comment suggests you may share Bermicourt’s view that backgammon in the East Med is not the same as Western backgammon. I believe there is no WP:RS-based evidence for this claim, and significant evidence to suggest that the claim is wrong – i.e. East Med backgammon and Western backgammon are now basically the same. Bermicourt and I discussed this in detail at the Tables Games article earlier this year, and I thought we had reached an agreement. But here I find the old claim being rehashed, but with no additional evidence. If you do share Bermicourt’s view here, please could you share any evidence that you have for it? Onceinawhile (talk) 23:44, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

I've removed the text from the lede, but now the question is what to do with the section "Cultural significance" which contains the same opening line. My sense is that this clearly relates to tables games played in the eastern Med and, if anything, belongs to the tables game article, certainly not here. So I think a move, rather than a deletion, would be justified along with a tweak to the first line e.g. "Certain tables games are considered as national games in many countries of the Eastern Med..." However, adding the text to that article begs the question "what about the cultural significance of tables games elsewhere which is a much bigger topic of which this is just a small subset." Bermicourt (talk) 21:23, 14 August 2022 (UTC)

@Bermicourt: you and I discussed this section in the thread immediately above this when it was first written. Now I find that you proposed deleting it, yet decided not to ping me or message me on my talk page. That is uncollaborative and really very poor behavior.

From an editorial standpoint, you claim, with no evidence, that the sources for Turkey and Cyprus are wrong to equate tavli with backgammon. That interpretation is WP:OR. We follow sources. And those sources clearly state that backgammon is considered the national sport in those countries. As for Greece, I can bring you multiple additional sources which say the same thing if you are unsure about the existing one.

I have explained previously my understanding that standard backgammon has in modern times become the primary form of tables game across the East Med region. But neither your or my views are what matters here - only sources. And as editors we do NOT have the right to ignore sources because they don’t fit with our own personal views.

Onceinawhile (talk) 23:34, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I thought you were watching this article more closely and would join the discussion earlier.

There are many online articles and even Backgammon books that equate Backgammon with other tables games; they are simply repeating one another without citing any sources. They are thus not reliable sources. And my comment that the sources for Turkey and Cyprus are wrong to equate tavli with backgammon is not WP:OR; the sources are cited in the relevant articles and I shouldn't need to repeat them with every comment. For example, Parlett (1999) lists Cypriot Tavli separately from Backgammon pointing out that "the significant difference is that a player hitting a blot does not therefore oust it but pins it so that it cannot move..." Meanwhile the differences in game mechanics between Turkish Tavla and Backgammon are tabulated at Backgammon Galore. Also, the reference by "Syria" does not support the claim that Backgammon is Syria's national game; it merely quotes a player saying "It’s a tradition in Syria. I couldn’t imagine life without it." The "it" is taawli which the English-speaking author of the article has equated to Backgammon, falling into the usual translation trap.

Of course, differences in mechanics are not the only features that define a game. Just as important is the culture: is it a pub game, gambling game or a family game? Is it only played by the upper or lower classes? Or by farmers during the long winter months? Is it played for small stakes or for sweets? Is it only played on certain feast days? Does it appear in stage plays? How is it presented in the literature? Are tournaments held? What is its history? What regions is it played in today? It would be valuable to capture the culture of the tables games in these different countries and enhance their individual articles. If we equate every tables game to Backgammon we impose a modern Western POV on the subject and inadvertently do a disservice to the wonderful variety of games and cultures that we are trying to highlight. Bermicourt (talk) 09:50, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Your evidence above shows only that other forms of Tables games have been played in those countries. It does not state that these alternative games are the most commonly played versions in those countries, and therefore does not contradict sources stating that (modern) Backgammon is the national game.

I would be interested to know if you have any first-hand experience on which you are basing your views. As I said previously, I have played backgammon in public places in almost all the countries of the East Med (I have a widely dispersed family, and friends in the countries where I do not have family), and at no point did anyone ever suggest different rules to me. Only here on Wikipedia have I learned about all these apparent variations, which did not appear once in the real life situations that I experienced. Even the doubling dice was used with enthusiasm in every single location - albeit in more conservative countries / cities where gambling is frowned upon, it was used with subtlety. Onceinawhile (talk) 12:16, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

I tried to illustrate this a few months by pointing to the Wikipedia articles on the game in the languages of the East Med:[1]

I can go one better, and show you YouTube videos of the same:

• Greece: [2] My Palestinian family (now spread across the East Med) play with exactly the "rules" this guy is explaining...
• Turkey: [3] Mark B Olsen plays in a random cafe, with no suggestion of rule changes.
• Cyprus: [4] young people and [5] old people. Again, no evidence of alternative rules.
• Arabic-speaking countries: [6] the title "تعلم قوانين الطاولة - للمبتدئين" translates as "Learn the rules of Tawleh - for beginners". Again, it is the same game.

Onceinawhile (talk) 12:56, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

That is interesting if all those videos portray modern Western Backgammon (MWB). It may well be the case that MWB is played alongside traditional tables games and that there is a name confusion either caused by the locals referring to it by their traditional name and/or by Westerners referring to the traditional game as Backgammon. That would need detailed research to untangle as sometimes the rule differences are subtle but tactically important. Meanwhile, we can't use personal experience as a Wikipedia source. I carry out field trips myself, but I can't change articles by citing my notes even if I know Wikipedia is blatantly wrong. What we can do is publish our findings elsewhere and wait for Wikipedia to catch up. Bermicourt (talk) 13:24, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Agreed.

What we had above was a proposal to exclude reliable sources based on opinion. I propose to reinstate those sources.

Onceinawhile (talk) 13:36, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

The online sources cited should not be used to claim Backgammon is a national game in those countries since, as I have demonstrated, they are either not reliable or do not actually make that claim. I can't check the offline sources - where it isn't cited above, are you happy to cite the actual text that supports the claim? And are you also content that "Backgammon" is not being used by them parte pro toto to refer to other tables games? The word is so frequently misused that it's important to check what they are actually referring to. If it's MWB then that's great - equally if it's a local tables game, that's at least as important to record if we want to reflect local and national culture accurately. Bermicourt (talk) 15:38, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Oh and if Shesh Besh is the most popular tables game in Israel, that very similar, but not identical to MWB, at least according to Backgammon Galore which is a useful site for checking the rules.

A thought occurs to me. There would be nothing wrong with saying something like "many countries have games similar to Backgammon that are popular enough to be viewed as their national games. These include Tavla in Turkey, Shesh Besh in Israel...." That should not be in the lede, but could be included under "Related games". The individual national games could be linked to a separate article or a section in the tables game article where the rules are clarified and, if appropriate, key differences from MWB explained. Bermicourt (talk) 15:56, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

I provided my view on "Backgammon Galore" in this thread above, so I will not repeat it. It is not WP:RS. I believe you have been misled by that website, and its mistakes underpin this discussion.

You asked And are you also content that "Backgammon" is not being used by them parte pro toto to refer to other tables games? My answer below:

• MWB is widely played in all these countries. And the name given to MWB in those countries is Tawleh/Tavla/Tawulah/Tabli. I can state that with 100% certainty.
• Other tables games will be played by some people in these East Med countries, just as chess variants are played in every country of the world. However, we do not have any sources which assess the popularity of these vs. MWB, in the East Med or in any other region of the world.
• In the absence of reliable sources, I have assessed whether there is any basis to question to equation of the MWB with the common use of the names Tawleh/Tavla/Tawulah/Tabli. I have explained my personal experience. I have assessed other language wikipedias, and YouTube videos showing the game in these countries. And not once did I find any evidence of a basis to question this.

You write above There would be nothing wrong with saying something like "many countries have games similar to Backgammon that are popular enough to be viewed as their national games. These include Tavla in Turkey, Shesh Besh in Israel...." This would be incorrect, because these games are not "similar to" backgammon, they ARE backgammon.

Onceinawhile (talk) 07:52, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

I've just unearthed two university papers on Tavli in Greece by two Greek scholars which demonstrate quite emphatically that Greek Tavli is the most popular board game in Greece. However, it is not Backgammon but a trio of games. One of them, Fevga, is nothing like Backgammon - players play in the same direction and cannot hit each others pieces. The sources are cited in full at the Tavli article along with other sources that agree with them. These are, however, all "tables games" which is what "Tavli" means. But they are not Backgammon - they all have different rules and tactics. That's Greece and Cyprus sorted out. We can now deal with the others. Bermicourt (talk) 09:10, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. I have commented on this below. Please could you clarify your claim that they "demonstrate quite emphatically" the popularity of this variant? I saw the claim made only once in passing without a source in a PhD thesis. Onceinawhile (talk) 13:38, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

The game(s) in Greece

Just came across an interesting Greek university paper by Papahristou and Refanidis which sheds light on how the game is played there. Western Backgammon has been computer-analysed extensively, but they're analyzing its Greek cousins. This is what we learn:

Essentially the most popular form of tables game (they call them all Backgammon variants) in Greece is Tavli which is not one game, but a succession of three different games called Portes, Plakoto and Fevga which are played successively until a player reaches 5 or 7 points. There are three categories of tables game: hitting games (e.g. Backgammon and Portes), pinning games (e.g. Plakoto and Tapa) and running games (e.g. Fevga, Narde and Gul-bara). Their results show that two games may look very similar but their outcomes can vary considerably because of small differences in the rules. Bermicourt (talk) 18:59, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, I have just read this. The statement about the popularity of the succession-of-three-games comes from a PhD thesis, and is made in passing without a source. That thesis, and other papers by the authors, refer to one of the three as Backgammon, and the other two as Backgammon variants, yet the article just created (Tavli) does not use that term. Onceinawhile (talk) 13:17, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Adding to this. The PhD page which makes this claim of relative popularity without citation or explanation is here (p.33-34). The diagram they use looks to have been "borrowed" from the bkgm.com website without attribution - the PhD thesis was completed in 2015, but the exact diagram is on the bkgm website as of 2004.[7] As shown above, the bkgm website is not WP:RS. Onceinawhile (talk) 17:14, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

The diagram is very simple – anyone could create it in PowerPoint – and it only illustrates the text. Perhaps it's open source? Anyway, it doesn't negate the paper as a RS. Bermicourt (talk) 18:24, 29 September 2022 (UTC)