The History and Distribution of ṭāb: A Survey of Petra’s Gaming Boards

Abstract

Previous articleNext article FreeThe History and Distribution of ṭāb: A Survey of Petra’s Gaming BoardsAlex de Voogt, Ahmad B. A. Hassanat, and Mahmoud B. AlhasanatAlex de VoogtAmerican Museum of Natural History Search for more articles by this author , Ahmad B. A. HassanatMuʾtah University, Jordan Search for more articles by this author , and Mahmoud B. AlhasanatAl-Hussein Bin Talal University, Jordan Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreIntroductionThe rules and presence of the game of ṭāb have been described for only a few parts of the Near East. In recent years, occasional attestations of game boards have been found in rock surfaces corresponding with geographical locations at the outer borders of the Ottoman Empire, such as Sudan and Oman. In those locations, the game boards were differentiated from Roman gaming practices.This survey of the archaeological region of Petra in Jordan reveals an unusually large number of ṭāb playing boards carved in rock surfaces. The study presents the implications of these finds for our understanding of the game, as well as the importance of this game for the history of the region.The history and distribution of the game known as ṭāb has been linked to the expansion of Islam.1 It is almost exclusively associated with areas that are part of the Muslim world, and is not found in sub-Saharan Africa or beyond the Near East. Early references to the game are not necessarily conclusive, as they do not include playing rules, but Thierry Depaulis2 has argued that Franz Rosenthal’s3 mention of a game found in an early fourteenth century poem is a reference to ṭāb. In addition, Thomas Hyde’s description of the game for the Arabs, in particular Palestinians,4 and Carsten Niebuhr’s report on the game in Syria and Egypt,5 confirm at least a few hundred years of history for the game in the Near East.The game of ṭāb, with its board’s four rows of small depressions, has also been attested at archaeological sites.6 The game boards have not been excavated, but have been recorded by archaeological surveys that focus on patterns carved in rock faces, often located near excavations. The time period to which such games can be dated is not necessarily that of the excavated materials, but the presence of carved games near archaeological sites suggests that the two are connected.The game of ṭāb in rock faces does not include the rules of play. The identification of the game is also not obvious, as the game is sometimes confused with four-row mancala or even backgammon, as Depaulis pointed out for an image of a game played in Turkey and misidentified as tavla.7 In 2003, a paper was published online on games in Petra as a follow-up to a conference presentation by Bilal Khrisat.8 There, the game of ṭāb was identified as mancala.The presence of four rows of small indentations, however, should rule out these two alternative games. If the game is found in the context of other games scratched on the same rock surface, then the context further assists in identifying both the game and its possible players. Sija (a game commonly using five rows of five holes) and two-row mancala with significantly larger cup-shaped holes were found next to a ṭāb board in northern Sudan.9 These were close to the ruins of an Ottoman fortress; since these boards are not used by the current population, an Ottoman introduction of these game boards has been suggested as most likely.10 Similarly, the presence of a games context in el-Kab, Egypt, may also suggest Ottoman soldiers as the makers of those examples.11The connection with the Ottomans has two interrelated aspects. First, the Ottomans’ historical presence and association with a specific location can be ascertained as in the case of fortresses. Second, carving games in rock faces is a specific practice, as all these games can also be played in the sand. In other words, the rock carvings confirm the presence of a particular group of players that habitually carved games in rock. The necessity of carving tools and a preference for rock over sand then circumscribe the people using these boards. For this reason, mancala games carved on the site of Palmyra in Syria,12 and sija and ṭāb games in Sudan and Egypt, are likely associated with Ottoman invaders rather than with local Arabs: first, since they are found at strategic locations, possibly associated with Ottoman soldiers, and not in random or residential locations; second, because they were carved in rock.The Players of the Game of ṭāb in PetraThis line of reasoning, however, becomes problematic in the case of Petra. The number of ṭāb game boards in Petra is disproportionately high, perhaps partly because the rock surface is comparatively easy to carve into. Also, the game boards are found in locations where Ottoman soldiers were less likely to reside.A 2003 publication provided a survey of at least seven boards that we can now identify as examples of ṭāb.13 It also showed a few examples of sija boards. It covered the area from the Petra visitor center to the site known as the Monastery (see Figure 1). In 2015, we completed a second survey that followed the hiking trail another six kilometers into what is known as Little Petra, and we identified at least eight additional ṭāb and nine more sija boards that are discussed below. 14 This is a total of at least fifteen ṭāb boards in the region of Petra.15Figure 1. Map of Petra and Little Petra with locations of game boards based on a previous study from 2003 (see n. 13) and our 2015 survey. See Table 1 for configurations and comments.View Large ImageDownload PowerPointWhat is central here is that the game of ṭāb has so far not been mentioned in previous studies, while an understanding of its features is essential for future studies of this kind. For instance, the Brown University Petra Archaeological Project has surveyed a wider area of Little Petra than presented here. They found dozens of additional configurations of holes, which were not yet identified as ṭāb and/or sija game boards, and which again have little archaeological context to either date the boards or ascribe them to any particular group of people.16 The Finnish Jabal Harun Project in Jordan also surveyed “rock art” and identified one sija game board, but did not publish a systematic overview of potential game boards.17 These latter two studies suggest that the game boards described in this study are only the beginning of a first understanding of the proliferation of carved ṭāb boards in the region. Indeed, rock outcrops in different parts of the desert of Jordan and neighboring countries may reveal additional examples.At Petra, the game of ṭāb is attested with the game of sija, parallel to the situation in Sudan and Egypt. The one or two ṭāb boards in those two locations, however, are in stark contrast with more than a dozen boards recorded in Petra. Also, there is no fortress or other military presence that would suggest a direct Ottoman introduction to Petra. Instead, the suggestion by Depaulis that ṭāb is quintessentially an Arab game still holds.Margaret Murray and J. C. Ellis excavated two games that can be associated with the Nabataeans.18 The first is what we now understand as a double version of “five lines,” a game associated with Greco-Roman influence and found at several archaeological sites in the Near East.19 The second is an example of the game of latrunculi, a board of about nine by nine squares in this case, its distribution also associated with the expanse of the Roman Empire, attested in different sizes as far north as England and as far south as Egypt. The presence of Roman games in Nabataean archaeological contexts is to be expected. Since no other games were found with such a context, it is not likely that the Nabataeans were players of ṭāb. There are also no other indications that ṭāb dates back to Roman times or earlier.It is reasonable to suggest that the Bedouin of Jordan are the main players of ṭāb, since they are present in several camps around the site of Petra. This would follow other accounts in which Bedouin are associated with the game.20 However, the suggestion of a Bedouin origin for the game would be problematic, as it ignores its presence among many Arabic-speaking people, most of whom are not Bedouin. The early attestation in Turkey and the Ottoman links established for other locations also suggest that a Bedouin origin is not an obvious one, or cannot be deduced from the present evidence.In light of the above, it suffices to state that a Nabataean origin of the game boards at Petra is unlikely. Instead, the Arab and/or Bedouin population is a more plausible group to have been carving ṭāb-games near Petra, and they may have either taught or been taught by the Ottomans. An ancient history of the game of ṭāb cannot be determined with the current examples, and the number of archaeological and ethnographic surveys of ṭāb in the Near East is too limited to draw more specific conclusions.Aspects of Carved BoardsThe presence of at least fifteen ṭāb and twelve sija boards carved in rock allows for an analysis that is not possible with games played in the sand. The ṭāb boards are eroded in different ways and to different degrees. Since they occur in the same environment and to some extent carved on similar rock faces, it suggests that the boards date to different time periods. Eroded boards have been reworked and rows have been added or partially added to either change the board configuration or address problems of erosion. This suggests that erosion partly explains their ubiquitous presence, as recarving of boards are likely to have been frequent. Geological aging by measuring exposure time may provide a minimum age. This method was used to determine the minimum age of mancala boards discovered in Qatar.21 Unfortunately, these results are not particularly precise, and cannot tell us more than a minimal age of the boards, while the presence of reworked boards and missing data on the rate of erosion further complicate such an analysis.A few examples show hardly any erosion or amendment to the boards, while others are eroded in such a way that the number of holes per row remains clearly visible. These boards help to determine the range of variations present: boards seem to vary between four rows of seven to four rows of fourteen (see Table 1). Unlike the description by Harold J. R. Murray,22 both even and uneven numbers of holes per row are found; indeed each number from seven to fourteen is represented at least once. This, apart from the even numbers, follows the description of Edward Lane for Egypt, who collected his information in the 1820s and 1830s.23 It is at least curious to note that each of these variations is present and that no particular preference has been given to any of the variations. Extensive variation needs to be sustained by a relatively large players’ community, something that seems to be confirmed by the omnipresence of the boards on the site. Erosion may also explain the repeated carving of so many boards, but it does not explain the variation attested here.Table 1. Overview of game boards and their configurations found in Petra, as plotted on the map in Figure 1.ṬabconfigurationcommentSijaconfigurationcomment14 × 13 A7 × 7 24 × 11 B7 × 7 34 × 10partial fifth rowC7 × 7 44 × 11fourth row erodedD7 × 7+(Ṭab 11) 54 × 14partial fifth rowE5 × 5 64 × 12 F5 × 7irregular pattern74 × 12 G7 × 8 84 × 8partial fifth rowH5 × 8+7 × 9possibly 6 × 9 instead of 7 × 994 × 10two rows have an extra holeI7 × 7+7 × 9 104 × 8 J5 × 11 114 × 10+(Sija D)intertwined boards 124 × 9possibly 4 × 10 134 × 7one enlarged hole on one side 144 × 12possibly 4 × 13 154 × 8 View Table ImageIn one case (see Figure 2 for game boards 11 and D) a ṭāb board is intertwined with a sija board. The latter example, which suffered little erosion, shows clearly that the same population played both games, since the boards are similar in terms of erosion and the shape and design of the holes. The large number of holes needed for each game would make an overlapping board design an efficient approach.Figure 2. Game boards 11 and D.View Large ImageDownload PowerPointAlthough the number of sija boards is smaller, their variation is equally pronounced. They have five or seven rows of five, seven, eight, or nine holes. This is contrary to the literature, in which the game rules are mostly described for boards consisting of five rows of five holes.24 For the purposes of this article, all these boards are named sija, but future ethnographic work would need to support that. On at least two occasions, there seem to be two sija boards close to each other. This may be due to erosion; but then only part of the board would need to be remade. It is more likely that multiple players would share the same playing spot.Occasionally it is possible to confuse a ṭāb and a sija configuration. In one example (H), a sija board of six or seven rows of nine is joined by a board of five rows of eight. On another spot (J), there is a board of five rows of eleven holes (Figure 3). Boards with five rows are unlikely candidates for ṭāb, but boards larger than nine with a much smaller number of columns are equally unlikely for sija. It is more plausible that they are two sija boards played by two sets of players, even though the separation of the boards, and thereby the preferred configuration of holes, remains unclear.Figure 3. Game board J.View Large ImageDownload PowerPointCharacteristics of ṭāb Rules and the Problem of GamblingIn 2009, we collected a set of four wooden stick dice for the American Museum of Natural History in New York; they had been used by a group of men demonstrating the game of ṭāb in Petra (Figure 4).25 The rules that were collected on-site through observation and participation by the authors in 2009 and again in 2015 are close to the rules for ṭāb published by Harold Murray.26 Murray mentions this game for Turkey, Egypt, and Persia, so its presence in Jordan is not necessarily surprising. The game of ṭāb is consistently described as played with four throwing-sticks or stick dice. These are made of split pieces of wood that have a flat and a convex side. Four of these sticks create a set of five different throws that determine the movement of the pieces on the board.Figure 4. Four men demonstrating the game of ṭāb in Petra. Four stick dice are used and the board is impressed in the sand. Photograph: Alex de Voogt 2009.View Large ImageDownload PowerPointThe presence of stick dice does not make ṭāb a gambling game. Gambling may occur with any game if one is betting on the outcome. Gambling is more common if bets can be placed frequently, as in most casino games. Randomizing devices such as dice that are used to determine the move of the pieces are common for so-called race games,27 the object of which is to reach a certain part of the board before your opponent. In war games, however, the object is to capture the opponents’ pieces. The game of ṭāb is unusual in that it has both a race and a war game component, also known as a running-fight game.28 The pieces follow a track on the board after which they need to capture the opponents’ pieces. The options for moving pieces that a dice throw affords in the course of the game are such that the game should be considered a competitive strategic game rather than a gambling game.Rules of ṭābThe following is a description of the game of ṭāb as it is played near Petra. It is noted that this is not necessarily the only variant in use.29Ṭāb has two teams of two players each. They use four stick dice, flat on one side and convex on the other. A board with four rows is commonly made in the sand with, for example, twelve holes in each row. The number of holes varies and may be odd or even. Each team of players has in this case eleven pieces or “puppies” (i.e., one fewer than the number of holes), in some way differentiated from the opponents’ pieces, often by color. A team’s home row is the row nearest them. Each team places one piece in each hole of their home row, leaving the far right hole empty. The two center rows have no pieces at the start of the game.The stick dice throws have the following values: 0. flat = 6 + throw again1. flat = 1 + throw again—this throw is called “ṭāb” (meaning “[a] good [move]”)2. flat = 23. flat = 34. flat = 4 + throw againEach piece on the home row is immobile until moved one hole to the right with a ṭāb throw; this makes the piece “āṣram” (literally “ripe,” but in this context meaning “good to move”), and after this it may be moved with any throw. Pieces must be made āṣram in order, from the rightmost piece to the leftmost piece on the home row. Thus, a team cannot begin moving any pieces until it has thrown a ṭāb. If you do not throw ṭāb in the first move, you have to wait your turn for another try. In some variations, the far right hole also begins with a piece, and the rule that a piece’s initial move requires a ṭāb is ignored for this initial stage of the game; this variation speeds up the opening game.In a game with teams of two, player one throws and often waits until player two (the teammate) has thrown as well before moving any pieces; the combined throws are played out on the board in the order the players desire. This way, they can optimize their moves. Similarly, when a player is allowed to throw again, it is not necessary to play a piece first. The player is allowed to wait until all the throws have finished, after which the optimal order of moves is determined. This allows for much strategy in the game. Each throw is played individually. That is, throws of 4 and 2 may be played as 4 then 2, or 2 then 4 (either among different pieces or with the same piece), but not as a single move of 6.After a piece reaches the right end of the home row, it proceeds up one hole and begins moving clockwise in the two center rows. Here the piece will circle in the center two rows until it is captured or (optionally) moved into the opponent’s home row, as follows: once all your pieces are āṣram, it is allowable to move pieces from the middle rows into your opponent’s home row, moving from the rightmost hole of the far center row up to the rightmost hole of your opponent’s home row, thence (if desired) left along that row. If you land on any hole occupied by an opponent piece, you capture it and remove it from the game.You may move one or more of your own pieces onto the same hole, creating a set; but within your home row, you may only perform this action once all your pieces are āṣram. The set then moves as a whole and is potentially captured as a whole. To disassemble a set, you need to throw ṭāb to remove one piece to the next position.A set is not allowed to move around in the back row of your opponents. Once it reaches this row or is created in this row, it stays put. Only if no other moves are possible can a set on your opponents’ row be moved. However, the set’s component pieces may be moved at any time, if they are first disassembled with a ṭāb. The team that has no more pieces left has lost the game.The rules of ṭāb stand out in the history of board games as a running-fight game.30 The particularities are of interest, since they make the transmission of this game to different parts of the Muslim world easily traceable. Rules described for Turkey, Jordan, and Egypt show convincingly that intensive contact between these regions took place with regards to the rules of this game. The particularities of the game rules and the support of different variations of game boards both point to an extensive playing community responsible for the transmission of this game in the Near East, as previous studies on the cultural transmission of other board games have pointed out.31The presence of dice is of interest for the reception of this game in Islam. The discussion in the classical Arabic sources mostly pertains to nard, a term that refers to an Islamic version of English backgammon or French trictrac, and to chess. Reinhard Wieber explains that the Arabic discussion on board games ultimately goes back to two passages in the Qurʾān and extensive discussions in the ḥadīth, i.e., the traditions about the Prophet that were transmitted by his companions and their successors.32 One Qurʾānic verse states: “They ask you concerning wine and games of chance. Say, ‘In (both) is great vice, and profits for mankind; and the vice in them is greater than the profit.’” (Qurʾān 2,219).33 The game of nard has been consistently connected with gambling and, therefore, forbidden in much of the classical Arabic literature.34As argued above, dice do not necessarily suggest a gambling practice; but unlike ṭāb, the game of nard has many anecdotes related to problems of gambling. The game of ṭāb seems largely absent from classical Arabic literature. Depaulis found that Ibn Hajar al-Haytami denounced the game in a moral treatise known as the al-Zawajir, and further research using the Arabic sources may reveal more.35 But compared to nard, the game is largely absent from this literature, and is certainly not central to the discussion on gambling. This may have given ṭāb a much less problematic dispersal in the Muslim world.In contrast to chess and nard, ṭāb did not develop into a tradition using wooden boards. Boards carved in rock or made in the sand have the added advantage of easily varying the number of playing fields; this variation is shown to be common for sija and ṭāb in the Petra area, while it is generally uncommon for chess and nard. Yet the absence of wooden playing boards or any portable playing devices in both the ethnographic and archaeological record, similar to certain four-row mancala games in southwest Africa, makes it difficult for this game to enter city life. Cafés in Jordan, Syria, Turkey, and Egypt are known for men playing a variety of games, but not ṭāb. Wooden mancala boards from all these countries have been attested as well, and while not played in cafés, it has allowed them to be played inside houses and throughout cities. It is not unimaginable that ṭāb also gets played indoors; a recent blog from Sudan shows that people may opt to put a pile of sand on the floor of the house in order to create a board.36 Here, four rows are shown with at least thirteen pieces on each side, and the image shows four stick dice just being thrown. This is also contrary to a Sudanese ṭāb version described in the literature that has four or six rows of ten holes, with only six pieces each.37With our knowledge of Petra, the material aspect of ṭāb now has two parts. It is played in the sand as well as on rock faces. In both cases, the game is found using a variety of board configurations. The rock games allow a more permanent record of this game and its variations while documenting a gaming practice that has remained elusive in the literature. But the distribution of the game in the Near East and the documented variety of game boards suggest that a thriving playing community has been present but has gone largely unnoticed.The Role of ṭāb in the History of the Near EastUnlike the games of chess and backgammon, the game of ṭāb as it is described for Jordan is not found outside the Near East. However, Depaulis and Murray have each described a variety of related games in Africa and Scandinavia for which the historical connections still need to be explored.38 The history and distribution of the game is difficult to determine due to the paucity of ethnographic descriptions as well as the absence of boards other than those found in the sand. The presence of ṭāb games carved in rock allow for a better understanding of its history and distribution, and this study provides a starting point in Petra for further comparative research.Previous literature would lead us to suggest that the game of ṭāb is rare and is not (or at least is no longer) popular. Personal experience of the authors contradicts this statement for Jordan, but the presence of the game boards in Petra documents in detail that such a tradition has been in place for a few centuries. Depaulis has traced the game back to at least 1694 and potentially to nearly four hundred years earlier,39 but it is equally significant that Lane documented playing rules that are largely similar to those still in use today, with variations of playing boards that are attested in Petra.40 Also, a recent description of the game played by the Bedouins in the Negev suggests that it is still played in different parts of the Near East.41 In other words, the Near East has supported a playing tradition for ṭāb for several hundred years that continues to this day at least in Jordan, but that has eluded description due to the ephemeral nature of the playing materials. Petra is an important witness to this activity, and its evidence should also help archaeological studies that try to identify game boards on stone surfaces elsewhere in the Near East. Notes 1 . Thierry Depaulis, “Jeux de parcours du monde arabo-musulman (Afrique du Nord et Proche-Orient),” Board Game Studies 4 (2001): 54.2 . Ibid.3 . Franz Rosenthal, Gambling in Islam (Leiden, 1975).4 . Thomas Hyde, Mandragorias seu Historia shahiludii (De Ludis orientalibus libri duo: 1. Historia shahiludii; 2. Historia nerdiludii) vol. 2 (Oxford, 1694), 217–24.5 . Carsten Niebuhr, Reisebeschreibung nach Arabien und andern umliegenden Ländern (Zürich 1774), 188–89.6 . See Alex de Voogt, “The Introduction of mancala to Sai Island,” in The Fourth Cataract and Beyond, Proceedings of the 12th International Conference for Nubian Studies, ed. Julie Anderson and Derek Welsby (London, 2014), 1017–20; Walter Crist, Anne-Elizabeth Dunn-Vaturi, and Alex de Voogt, Ancient Egyptians at Play: Board Games Across Borders (London, 2016), 153.7 . Depaulis, 2001: 54.8 . Author unknown, “Ancient Board Games and the Nabataeans”: http://nabataea.net/games3.html (copyright CanBooks, 2003), accessed November 2016.9 . de Voogt, “Introduction of mancala.”10 . Ibid.11 . Crist, Dunn-Vaturi, and de Voogt, Ancient Egyptians at Play, 160.12 . Alex de Voogt, “Mancala players at Palmyra,” Antiquity 84 (2010): 1055–66.13 . “Ancient Board Games and the Nabataeans.” Some boards were not provided with a location, and since 2003 other boards have been documented that were either more recently incised or not part of the original survey; see Crist, Dunn-Vaturi, and de Voogt, Ancient Egyptians at Play, 153.14 . Permission for this survey and the subsequent publication was granted by the Chief Commissioner of the Petra Development and Tourism Authority, representing the Jordan Department of Antiquities.15 . Other configurations such as three rows of seven indentations have not been included in this survey, as these games cannot be recognized or are perhaps unfinished examples.16 . We gratefully acknowledge Alex Knodell, Christopher Tuttle, and Susan Alcock for providing us access to the BUPAP database: http://archaeologydata.brown.edu/petra/. The game boards in this database are as of yet unpublished. See also Alex Knodell and Susan Alcock, “Brown University Petra Archaeological Project: The Petra Area and Wadi Silaysil Survey, 2010 Season,” Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 55 (2011): 489–508; Alex Knodell and Susan Alcock, “Landscapes North of and Nearby Petra: The Petra Area and Wadi Silaysil Survey (Brown University Petra Archaeological Project, 2010–2011),” in The Nabataeans in Focus: Current Archaeological Research at Petra. Papers from the Special Session of the Seminar for Arabian Studies Held on 29 July 2011, ed. Laïla Nehmé and Lucy Wadeson. Supplement to Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 42 (2012), 5–16.17 . Annika Eklund, “The rock art of Jabal Hārūn,” in Petra: The Mountain of Aaron III: The Archaeological Survey, ed. Paula Kouki and Mika Lavento (Helsinki, 2013), 281–95.18 . Margaret A. Murray and J. C. Ellis, A Street in Petra (London, 1940), 35.19 . Ulrich Schädler, “Mancala in Roman Asia Minor,” Board Game Studies 1 (1998): 10–25.20 . For a recent example, see Ada Katsap and Fredrick L. Silverman, Ethnomathematics of Negev Bedouins’ Existence in Forms, Symbols and Geometric Patterns (Rotterdam, 2016).21 . Raid Hassiba et al., “Determining the age of Qatari Jabal Jassasiyah Petroglyphs,” QScience Connect 4 (2012): 1–16.22 . Harold J. R. Murray, A History of Board-Games other than Chess (Oxford, 1952), 95–96.23 . Edward W. Lane, Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians (London, 1908), 353. Phil Winkelman (pers. comm.) has noted inconsistencies and several apparent defects in Lane’s description of the rules, which makes future comparisons of his rule set problematic.24 . One of a few exceptions is found in Katsap and Silverman (Ethnomathematics, 260) who mention variations of 7 × 7 and 9 × 9 boards.25 . American Museum of Natural History Catalog No: 70.3/7224.26 . Murray, History of Board Games, 95–96.27 . Ibid.; Alex de Voogt, “A Classification of Board Games,” in New Approaches to Board Games Research: Asian perspective and future research, ed. Alex de Voogt (Leiden, 1995), 9–15.28 . Robert C. Bell, Board and Table Games (London, 1960).29 . We are particularly grateful to Phil Winkelman for his comments and suggestions concerning the description of the rules.30 . Depaulis, “Jeux de parcours.”31 . Alex de Voogt, Anne-Elizabeth Dunn-Vaturi, and Jelmer W. Eerkens, “Cultural transmission in the Ancient Near East: Twenty Squares and Fifty-eight Holes,” Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013): 1715–30.32 . Reinhard Wieber, Das Schachspiel in der arabischen Literatur von den Anfängen bis zur zweiten Hälfte des 16. Jahrhunderts, Beiträge zur Sprach-und Kulturgeschichte des Orients 32 (Walldorf-Hessen, 1972): 146–47.33 . Trans. Muhammad Mahmoud Ghali, Towards Understanding the Ever-Glorious Qur’an (Cairo, 1996).34 . See also Rosenthal, Gambling in Islam.35 . Depaulis, “Jeux de parcours”: 54.36 . Extracted 19 June 2013 from https://www.facebook.com/NubiaPage/photos/a.10150317218930500.561725.433515595499/10157544162025500/?type=3&theater.37 . R. Davies, “Some Arab Games and Puzzles,” Sudan Notes and Records 8 (1925): 146.38 . Depaulis, “Jeux de parcours”; Murray, History of Board-Games.39 . Depaulis, “Jeux de parcours.”40 . Lane, Manners and Customs.41 . Katsap and Silverman, Ethnomathematics. Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Journal of Near Eastern Studies Volume 76, Number 1April 2017 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/690502 © 2017 by The Journal of Near Eastern Studies. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.