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Encyclopedia ID 815

Tawla

Also known as Nard · Shesh Besh · backgammon

Illustration pattern only. No free-licence photograph yet: can you suggest one?

Two players race fifteen checkers around a twenty-four point board using dice, hitting blots and bearing off.

Heritage note

Part of the living heritage of Iraq, Syria, Jordan.

Origins

Usually placed in the era of River Valleys and First Cities (about 3000 to 1000 BCE), although its exact origins are uncertain, within the cultural world of Mesopotamia, Levant and Arabia.

Sources

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