Boardgames – from Senet to Monopoly to Chess
Have you ever heard of Senet?
Senet (or Senat) is a board game from Predynastic and ancient Egypt. The oldest hieroglyph representing a Senet game dates to around 3100 BC. The full name of the game inEgyptian was zn.t n.t ḥˁb meaning the “game of passing”.
Nefertari playing Senet. Painting in tomb of Egyptian QueenNefertari (1295–1255 BC). from OriginalPeople.org
Well, we don’t have a game of Senet in our shop … but we do have quite a variety of games. The following shows only a few of the many available: Beverly Hillbillies card game, Cootie, Password, original Master Mind, Backgammon, The Standard RADIO Game, and Cribbage. But these is merely a small sampling of the many games we have available for all ages!
We have a number of chess sets and many games for younger kids.
Ever wonder who invented board games? Here’s a great article:
People were playing board games earlier than we have any records. Probably the first board games were scratched into dirt. People played with stones or fruit pits for pieces. … About 400 BC people in China began to play a form of chess, and gradually people in India and Central Asia learned to play chess. Greater interest in board games led to the Indian invention of Parcheesi around 300 AD, and a version of Chutes and Ladders about 1200 AD. from quatr.com
Is your family no longer playing board games? Is everyone on their phones, iPads or glued to a computer game? Do you want to get back to some real family time again!
Consider this quote from an article on Scholastic.com:
Games don’t need to be overtly academic to be educational, however. Just by virtue of playing them, board games can teach important social skills, such as communicating verbally, sharing, waiting, taking turns, and enjoying interaction with others. Board games can foster the ability to focus, and lengthen your child’s attention span by encouraging the completion of an exciting, enjoyable game. Even simple board games like Chutes and Ladders offer meta-messages and life skills: Your luck can change in an instant — for the better or for the worse. The message inherent in board games is: Never give up. Just when you feel despondent, you might hit the jackpot and ascend up high, if you stay in the game for just a few more moves.
Stop into Bahoukas in Havre de Grace, Maryland, soon. Pick out a game or two. Wrap ’em up and place them under the tree. Then when Christmas Day and Dinner begin to move into slow gear, bring out a game or two and enjoy your family and friends.
