Prehistoric India to 1000 B.C. c12.151

c12.151

A couple of bricks have been found roughly scored with lines marking out a game: one contains part of the whole pattern which might either have been similar to a known Sumerian games-board or another type from Egypt. The other brick has a row of depressions into which pebbles or something similar, such as beans, could be flicked, in the manner of the games of certain African tribes. Both bricks probably came from pavements, and contrive to give a convincing picture of household servants playing, and probably gambling, in a shaded corner of the courtyard. Dice were certainly used, and must mean games of chance: the arrangement of the ‘spots’ was not the same as that usual today, when any two opposite sides add up to seven, but 1 is opposite 2, 3 opposite 4, and 5 opposite 6. Incidentally, a similarly marked piece has been found as far away as Tepe Gawra in the north of Iraq, with other evidence of Indian contacts. This use of dice is interesting in view of the great popularity of gambling on some game of chance among the Aryans, whose arrival in India, as we shall see, marks the end of the Harappā civilization.