Goose play

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19th century Goosy Goosy Gander schedule ( McLoughlin Bros. , USA)

The goose game (English: Game of the Goose , French: Jeu de l'oie , Italian: Gioco dell'oca ; Spanish: Juego de la oca , Dutch: Ganzenbord ) is a traditional board game for two to nowadays usually six players, which is called one of the oldest and most widespread board games in Europe and a prototype of many modern dice and running games.

Origin and history

The “mythological” origin of the game of goose seems to go back a long way in history. This has been the case since 3000 BC. The ancient Egyptian game Mehen (in German "rolled up"), whose circular board has the shape of a rolled-up snake, is understood as the forerunner of the game of goose. The famous Phaistos Disc is sometimes interpreted as a board game in the style of an ancient goose game.

The "modern" origin of the game of goose - as we know it today - has to be located in Europe from the 15th to the 16th century. One theory goes that it first appeared in Germany in 1471. It is documented that around 1580 Francesco de 'Medici from Florence gave the Spanish King Philip II a particularly elegant version of the game. The game enjoyed great popularity at court and subsequently spread across Europe. In 1597, a certain John Wolfe registered the game in London under the title The newe and most pleasant game of the Goose . In the 17th century it was particularly popular in Spain, France, Italy and the Netherlands and it was not uncommon for high stakes to be played.

At the end of the 19th century the game turned into a "harmless" children's game. It was at this time that the first commercial versions of the goose game appeared, which has continued to appear in new editions up to the present day.

The game

Furnishing

For the game, the game board with the 63 spirally arranged fields, two six-sided dice and a number of game pieces corresponding to the number of players - mostly in the shape of a goose - are used.

Rules of the game

All players start from field 1 on the outer edge of the board, roll two dice in turn (usually the youngest player starts) and move their geese (pieces) the corresponding number of fields towards the goal in the middle. Often one dice is used to play with. Whoever reaches the “goose garden” (field 63) first has won. However, it is important to reach this square exactly - if you roll a higher number, you have to return to the beginning and start the extra steps from here again. Variation at Jeu de Marine : Here you have to "sail back" the excess dice from the end. If a goose lands on one of the special spaces at the end of its turn , i. H. a goose or event field, the following special rules apply, which may differ slightly from game variant to game variant or country to country:

Special fields

Detail of a game board from the 16th century with some special fields
  • The goose spaces (spaces 5, 9, 14, 18, 23, 27, 32, 36, 41, 45, 50, 54 and 59): A goose that comes onto one of these spaces may move the number rolled again. If she gets to a goose field again, she may move forward again, etc.
  • The bridge (spaces 6 and 12): If a pawn lands on space 6, it can move directly to space 12, if the other way round it lands on space 12, it must immediately return to space 6. In both cases you can then roll again.
  • The hostel (field 19): skip a round.
  • The well (space 31): If you land on this space, you must stop until another goose comes to stand exactly on this space and in turn falls into the well , while the rescued goose is allowed to move on normally.
  • The dice (spaces 26 and 53): If a goose lands on space 26, it can move directly to space 53; if it lands on space 53 the other way around, it must return to space 26 immediately. In both cases you can then roll again.
  • The labyrinth (box 42): Return to box 30.
  • The prison (field 52): skip three rounds.
  • Death or The Fox (space 58): The player's goose is killed and must start over in the next round on space 1.

symbolism

Many elements and aspects of the game of goose can be assigned symbolic or mystical meanings:

  • The spiral has been a symbol of infinity and immortality since ancient times.
  • The sequence of the fields can be interpreted as an image of the human path of life, which is determined by an uncertain fate and on which luck and bad luck, forwards and backwards, gain and loss constantly alternate.
  • The target field of the game, the so-called "goose garden ", can be understood as a vision of paradise .
  • In addition, connections to the field of number mysticism can be recognized in the goose game : In ancient times , the 63rd year was considered the most dangerous in a person's life, and every subsequent year as a gift from the gods. It is also probably no coincidence that the checksum of the number of the "death field" 58 results in the unlucky number 13.

variants

Over the years, countless variants of the goose game have emerged, which differ from each other mainly in the subject matter and in the design of the game board, while the spiral arrangement of the 63 playing fields and the position of the special fields are mostly the same.

  • 17th century
    Juego de la Oca
    (Spain)

  • 1792
    Jeu de Marine
    (France)

  • 19th century
    Juego de la Oca
    (Spain)

  • 1898
    Jeu de l'affaire Dreyfus et de la vérité
    (France)

  • 19th century, cover
    Goosy Goosy Gander
    ( McLoughlin Bros. , USA)

  • 19th Century Rules of the Game
    Goosy Goosy Gander
    ( McLoughlin Bros. , USA)

  • 1884
    The Bürgerpark dice game
    (Verlag Carl Rocco, Germany)

Trivia

  • On Jakobsplatz in Logroño there is a large floor mosaic that assigns the fields of the goose play to the stations of the Camino de Santiago .
  • In the 19th century, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was inspired by this game for the poem Life is a goose game .
  • In his 1899 novel The Testament of an Eccentric , Jules Verne turns the United States into a giant game of goose in which players compete against each other to win a grand inheritance.
  • In Spain and Italy, the goose game was in the 1990s under the name El gran juego de la oca or Il Grande Gioco Dell'Oca (in German "The great goose game") template for television shows.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Paragraph about the snake game on the pages The World of the Ancient Egyptians
  2. ↑ Page Digital Egypt for Universities of University College London (in English)
  3. ↑ E-book by H. Peter Aleff The Board Game on the Phaistos Disk (in English)
  4. ↑ According to Parabola Magazine, June 6, 1992
  5. ↑ Illustration of an excerpt from the royal and extremely enjoyable game with the goose ( Memento from August 17, 2005 in the Internet Archive )
  6. ^ Page of the Fundación Joaquín Díaz about an exhibition on the Juego de la oca ( Memento of September 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) (in Spanish)
  7. ↑ E-book by H. Peter Aleff The Board Game on the Phaistos Disk (in English)
  8. ↑ Manuscript of the SWR 2 program Life is a goose game
  9. ↑ Media workshop knowledge

literature

Web links

Commons : Goose Game  - Collection of images, videos and audio files