Ancient Checkers – The Roots of Checkers Today

The common game that we now know today as checkers or draughts has been around for thousands of years. The form of ancient checkers was actually discovered in an archeological site at Ur, what is now known today as Iraq. Carbon dating shows that this particular game was played as far back as 3000 B.C. While it was no doubt the precursor to modern day checkers or draughts, this ancient checkers game used a slightly different board as well as a different number of pieces, and the exact rules that governed its game play remains uncertain.

There was an ancient checkers form widely played in Ancient Egypt called Alquerque that used a 5X5 board. Several historical accounts have traced the origins of this game to as far back as 1400 B.C. This game was so popular in fact, that it was played even in the west for thousands of years. There was even a form of ancient Greek checkers that was remarkably similar to this game.

The history of checkers tells that the game of checkers started to be played on a chess board in 1100A.D. The result of this development was that the game began to be played with 12 pieces on each side. This variation came to be known as "Fierges" or "Ferses", and it eventually adopted a rule that made jumping mandatory, an innovation that resulted in a name change to "Jeu Force". This particular version of the game was then considered a social activity primarily for women and was known as "Le Jeu Plaisant De Dames".

With the establishment of a more formal set of rules for checkers, the game made its way to England and America, where it became known as draughts and checkers respectively. Books began to appear on the subject in Spain by the mid 1500s, and an English mathematician named William Payne wrote a treatise on the game in 1756.

It was Dr. Thomas Hill, a mathematician, as well as a teacher and a preacher, who was instrumental in the further development in the history of checkers and the rules of the game, and who named it "Halma". This was an appropriate name for a game that could partially trace its roots to ancient Greek checkers, since Halma is the Greek word for "Jump".

Whatever name it was known by, the game continued to retain much of its popularity over the years and by 1847, the first world championship game of checkers was held.