Tables
Sympkyn of the Moor
Number of players: 2
Type of game: Dice / Race
Period: Roman to 17th Century
Tables is not one game but a whole family of games, played on the same board with the same pieces and dice. Backgammon is the best known survivor, but for well over a thousand years people across Europe and the Middle East played dozens of different tables games, each with its own starting position and rules. Medieval players would simply say they were “playing at tables”, and then agree which game they meant.
This page is an overview of the family. The individual games have their own pages, listed below.
History of Tables
Rome: The Romans played Tabula on a board of 24 points, with 15 men each and dice. It is the earliest clear ancestor of the family. An older Roman game, Ludus Duodecim Scriptorum (“the game of twelve lines”), was also a dice race game, but played on a board of three rows.
Persia: Nard was played in Sasanian Persia by the 6th century, and a Persian text of that time tells of its invention. It spread across the Islamic world as nard or nardshir.
Medieval Europe: By the high Middle Ages, tables were played all over Europe. In 1283 Alfonso X of Castile’s Libro de los Juegos described fourteen tables games, and English sources of the same period describe others, including Fayles.
The Name: The name comes from the board, which is divided into four quarters called tables. In Alfonso’s Spanish, tablas was the name for the pieces instead.
Irish and Backgammon: In the British Isles the favourite tables game of the 16th and 17th centuries was Irish. Backgammon, which is Irish with doublets played twice, appeared in the 17th century and gradually replaced it.
The Equipment
Board: A board of 24 points, usually drawn as long triangles, divided into four quarters (tables) of six points each. A bar divides the board into two halves of 12 points.
Men: Each player has 15 men (pieces), of different colours. A few games use fewer.
Dice: Most games use two six-sided dice. Some, such as Fayles and several of Alfonso’s games, use three.
Home: Each player has an inner table (home), from which they bear their men off at the end, and an outer table.
Terms Used in Tables Games
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Point | One of the 24 spaces on the board |
| Man | One of a player’s pieces |
| Blot | A single man alone on a point, which can be hit |
| Hit | Landing on a blot and sending it off the board, to start its journey again |
| Enter | Bringing a hit man back onto the board, in the quarter where it starts |
| Closed point | A point held by two or more men, which the opponent cannot land on |
| Prime | A run of closed points that the opponent cannot get past |
| Bear off | Taking your men off the board once they are all home |
| Doublets | A throw with the same number on both dice |
| Playing at length | Moving one man by the total of both dice, stopping on the point in between |
| Aftergame | A comeback plan of leaving blots to be hit on purpose, so the returning men can block the opponent |
Types of Tables Games
Most tables games follow the same basic idea: move all your men around the board into your home table, then bear them off first. They differ in how they get there.
Contrary Motion
The players move in opposite directions, so their men pass through each other and can hit one another. This is the most common type.
- Examples: Nard, Irish, Fayles, Alfonso’s Emperador and Todas Tablas, and Backgammon.
Same Direction
Both players move the same way around the board, chasing each other.
- Examples: Alfonso’s four-player game El Mundo, and the modern Long Nardy and Fevga.
Other Ideas
Starting Positions: Men may begin spread around the board, stacked on a few points, or off the board waiting to be entered, as in Alfonso’s Doze Canes.
Hitting or Not: In most games a lone man can be hit, but in a few, such as Laquet and Long Nardy, there is no hitting at all.
Special Losing Rules: In Fayles, a player who cannot play their throw loses at once.
Tables Games on This Site
Nard: the Persian ancestor of the family.
Irish: the English and Scottish favourite of the 16th and 17th centuries.
Fayles: a medieval English game with three dice, where failing to move loses.
Quinze Tablas: the first of Alfonso X’s tables games.
El Mundo: Alfonso X’s tables game for four players, one for each season.
Summary Table
| Rule Area | Details |
|---|---|
| Board | 24 points in four quarters (tables) of six |
| Men | Usually 15 each |
| Dice | Usually two, sometimes three |
| Aim | Bring all your men home and bear them off first |
| Main types | Contrary motion (opposite directions) or same direction |
| Descendants | Backgammon and its modern relatives |
Sources
- Charles Cotton, The Compleat Gamester, 1674.
- Alfonso X, Libro de los Juegos, 1283, translated by Sonja Musser Golladay.
- Wikipedia: Tables game, Nard, Irish.