Today we learnt about a number of new games, each of these games had the same basic structure and a similar rule set however they where each a different name, there was Tablut a game played on a 9x9 board using 8 white pieces and 16 black pieces, this had been seen in Lapland by a botanist named Linnaeus, there was the Welsh variation known as Tawl Bwrdd (translates to throw board) which was played on a larger board of 11x11 and was played with 12 white pieces and 24 black pieces, and then there was the Anglo Saxon Alea Evangelii or the game of the gospels which I have mentioned in a previous blog, this variation was played on a much larger 18x18 board and using 24 white pieces and 48 black pieces.
The overall objective of these games are the same, the players using the white pieces have a king piece, they must keep this piece protected at all times and have to move him to either a corner space on the board or to any of the edges of the board (this depends on which rule set you are playing), whereas if you are playing with the black pieces your objective is to capture the white king and to stop him from reaching the corners (or edge). It is possible to capture your opponents pieces to do this you need to have two of your pieces on either side of the opponent that you are trying to capture, for the blacks to capture the whites king you need to have the king blocked in with four of your pieces on either side of the king.
I will look through some of the notes that I have from this session and read through anything that may be able to give me anymore information about the game of Tablut and its other variations as this is one of the games that has grabbed my interest as something that I would like to look at further.
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