← Games Our Grandparents Played

Early medieval Ireland

Brandubh

Also called an Irish game of the tafl family

Tafl games were played across northern Europe for centuries before chess arrived. Brandubh, "black raven", is the Irish one, played on a small board of seven by seven.

Its exact rules were never written down in full; the rules played today are rebuilt from old poems and boards that have been dug up.

The rules, briefly

• One side has a king and four defenders in the middle; the other side has eight attackers around them.
• Every piece moves like a rook: any distance in a straight line, without jumping. Only the king may stand on the centre or a corner.
• Capture by trapping an enemy piece between two of yours. The king escapes by reaching a corner; the attackers win by surrounding him.

Try this: Two sides, two jobs

Play it twice, once on each side. The king's side wants open lines to a corner; the attackers want to close the corners first.

Play on AtlasTales (two players, one screen)

Read more: Brandubh on Wikipedia. Written from published sources; if your family plays it differently, write your rules down in Heirloom Rules, and if something here is wrong, tell us: hello@sparkanvil.org.