Tablan, Handmade

Item

Title (dcterms:title): Tablan, Handmade
Description (dcterms:description): Tablan is a traditional Indian board game for two players, similar to Backgammon and Tâb, where the goal is to occupy more of your opponent's home squares than they do yours. [1, 2, 3, 4]
Here's a more detailed breakdown: [1, 4, 5]

Origin & History: Tablan is an ancient Hindustani game originating in India, particularly in some villages in Mysore, southwestern India. [1, 4, 5] It could have originated from the Roman games Duodecima Scripta .
Tablan is a "running fight" game from Mysore in India. Two bands of twelve warriors fight their way to each other's stronghold. Can you get more of your warriors into enemy territory than your enemy can get into yours? The game is a traditional blend of luck and strategy still played relatively recently.

History of Tablan

There is a class of games known as running fight games, in which two players advance towards each other on a straight course according to the throw of dice or casting sticks. But instead of being a race, the winner of a running fight game is decided by the capture of pieces when the game ends.

Tablan is a running fight game. Although the board is two-dimensional, it represents a single track which has been folded in on itself.

The game is a traditional one from India, of unknown antiquity. It is apparently related to a smaller, but more complex, game called tab, which was first described in the west in 1694. Whether tablan is the ancestor or descendant of tab is not currently known.

According to R. C. Bell, tablan was still being played in the villages in Mysore, southwest India, in the second half of the twentieth century. It has been made known in the west partly by Bell's own books. (source: Cyningistan.com)

This particular board is made of Silk embroidery by Ramsons Kreera Kaushalya. They are working towards the rrevival of traditional Indian Boardgames. They manufacture handmade gameboards, casting pieces and counters. They collaborate with artists and artisans all across India to make these boardgames and their material have a number of varieties such as, Navalgund Jamkhana, Silk embroidery, Batik print, Mysore silk zari weaving etc. Other than variants in types of cloth and handloom they also manufacture boardgames on Marble, Mysore wood, Brass Casting, Wood Polychrome and many as such.
Alternative Title (dcterms:alternative): Tablaa, Tabufalaa, Tabul Phaley
Rules (dcterms:instructionalMethod): 4x12 board. Twelve pieces per player. Pieces begin in the outer rows of the board. Four sticks serve as dice, painted on one side and blank on the other. The throws are as follows: one blank side up = 2; two blank sides up = 0; three blank sides up = 0; four blank sides up = 8; four painted sides up = 12. Throws of 2, 8, and 12 give the player another throw. Players must use each throw to move a piece. They may only subdivide a throw in half to move two pieces, otherwise they must use one full throw to move a piece. The first move for each piece must be a throw of 2. This can be divided into two throws of 1 to move two pieces. Play moves from left to right in the player's home row, from right to left in the second row, left to right in the third row, and right to left in the opponent's home row. When a piece enters the opponent's home row, it can no longer move. When a player's piece lands on a space occupied by an opponent's piece, the opponent's piece is captured. A player may not land on the same space as another of the player's pieces. The player which fills up the most of the opponent's home row wins.
Creator (dcterms:creator): Ramsons
Contributor (dcterms:contributor): Souvik Mukherjee and Adrija Mukherjee
Rights (dcterms:rights): Creative Commons
Format (dcterms:format): Boardgame on cloth
Medium (dcterms:medium): Boardgame on Silk embroidery
References (dcterms:references): Tablan- Cyningstan; Tablan- Digital Ludemi Project; Bell, R. C. The Boardgame Book. First edition. Los Angeles : New York: The Knapp Press, 1979.
Spatial Coverage (dcterms:spatial): Mysore, Karnataka
Variants (dcterms:isVersionOf): Tabul Phale; Incomplete Board, Bull Temple; Tablan: Downloadable Game; Tablan, Pataleshwar; Graffiti Boardgame Tablan in Kailash Temple Ellora; Tablan
Entered by (dcterms:accrualMethod): Adrija Mukherjee
Notes (foaf:status): This board is on display at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta
Tags (dcterms:conformsTo): Ramsons; Tablan; Race game; Silk Board; Two-player; Dice

Media: Tablan .jpg