Ancient Arcades

Ancient Games

Ancient Arcades

Play our boards for free, right in your browser. No account, no download, no wagering — just the games as they were played, against a dealer or an opponent who doesn't get tired.

Faro

Frontier saloon · vs. the dealer

Back a rank, copper it to lose, keep cases on the rack, and call the last turn at four to one.

Play Faro

Nine Men's Morris

Ancient Rome · vs. Sextus

Set nine men, build a mill of three, take one of his. Three strengths, from raw recruit to centurion.

Play Morris

Fox and Geese

Medieval north · play either side

One fox against sixteen geese. He eats by jumping; they win by leaving him nowhere to step. Take whichever side you fancy.

Play Fox and Geese

Alquerque

Moorish Iberia · vs. Yusuf

Twelve stones a side on a lattice of lines. Captures are compulsory and chains are brutal — the grandfather of draughts.

Play Alquerque

Mancala

Sowing game · vs. Amina

Forty-eight seeds round twelve pits. Land your last seed at home and go again — chaining those turns is the whole game.

Play Mancala

Shut the Box

Pub dice · you against the odds

Roll two dice, flip tiles that add up to the total, and keep going until nothing fits. Closing all nine happens about once in twenty games.

Play Shut the Box

Patolli

Aztec race game · vs. Citlali

Five beans for dice and a cross of fifty-two squares. Land on her bead and it goes back to the start, so no lead is ever safe.

Play Patolli

Bul / Puluc

Mayan running fight · kernel dice

A single track, corn kernels for dice, and pieces that capture by landing on each other and march the prisoner home. Next on the bench.

In the workshop

Every game here is one we cut and engrave in hardwood. If you like playing it, you can own it.

Ancient Games · handmade historical boards