rithmomachia

[ursula]

I wrote about the medieval educational game of rithmomachia for the July AMS Feature Column.

Comments

[yhlee]

Ah, so cool! I referenced rithmomachia briefly in one of my short stories way back when ("Counting the Shapes" - the protagonist was a math magician) but never, uh, really learned how the game was played in any depth. *off to read*

[ursula]

It's hilariously elaborate! If I was going to play, I'd pick a nice simple win condition such as "first person to take three pieces".

[blackswanseer]

Fun article! I definitely need to reread it while sitting in front of my board though *L* I haven’t played in…wow, a couple of years now. And was absolutely a newbie at it.

Pretty fun to play in coffee shop type places and such though. We had servers peering curiously at us from around corners and someone once flat out asked what on earth we were playing.