059 The History of alquerque-12. Volume II. Remainder countries. 435 pages

437 pages

In volume II of this book you will find 32 Alquerque-12 places in Portugal and 66 in Italy. I believe that more boards will be found in Portugal and Italy in future.

The description of the game of Alquerque-12 is still at an awful quandary, because we have many Alquerque types and each game has its own history. King Alfonso the Wise already let us know in 1283 that there were the Alquerque-3, Alquerque-9, and Alquerque-12 games. Therefore the historical explication of the Alquerque-12 game cannot be given in general. However, we constantly see  archaeologists and historians publicising general descriptions in which they include the Alquerque-12 game:

"The origin of the game of Alquerque possibly dates back to the Bronze Age; figures known as "Tiras" have been found engraved on rocks in the Alpine region, especially near the Lake of Garda. In ancient Egypt  we find boards drawn on stone blocks that form the roof of the Temple of Kurna in the city of Luxor, dated to about 1400BC. As from the historical period they appear on the Galician rocks such as Maia or Baiona and from the Roman world we know the exemplars of Mulva (Sevilla). Others state that the game is thought to have originated in the Middle East."

So some experts let us think that the Alquerque-12 game is coming from ancient Egypt and the Roman world. Other historians follow Dr. Van der Stoep and try to convince us that the game was extremely popular in France, much more than in Spain. Basing themselves on etymology historians even dare to assert that the present checkers (draughts) game was developed in France and that it came there from the Alquerque-12 game.  Thus on the internet we see, for example, the following statement:

Alquerque had been played in ancient Egypt more than 3000 years ago, and it was brought to Europe in the 8th century by Moor warriors. This game was an inspiration for contemporary Checkers that was very popular around the world.

Who is the person partially responsible for these nice stories?  It is the famous boardgame specialist Harold James Ruthven Murray (1868 – 1955).   In 1952 Murray published “A History of Board Games Other Than Chess”, proposing the theory that Alquerque-12 originated in Egypt and draughts in France. Since his famous book about the History of Chess in 1913 everybody believed what the great board specialist Murray was saying because he was one of the greatest board game specialists. Many historians believe that Murray is infallible, but this attitude will only paralyze future work of others.

Being aware of the fact that till now there still exist some confusion about the Alquerque-12 game, I have concentrated this time on the history of this board game. Again we see that Spain has an important history of this game. For that reason I try to explain in my books about the history of the Alquerque-12 game together with notes on the draughts in order to refute Murray. It is quite clear that there are still some historians who do not believe in Isabelle of Castile. I am quite sure that the same will happen with my history of the Alquerque-12 game. On the other hand I am also sure that there will be other historians who will improve my points of view and that in the future I will receive the same recognition as Murray. However, this is the outcome of research where we are all interested in discovering the full truth at the end.

The Spanish history of the Alquerque-12 game is so important that it is worth some books being written about it.  Therefore I hope that my book will provide a great stir among the historians of draughts. At the same time I hope that Spanish archaeologists will template this game with a new perspective. When reading this book it will appear to the reader that the Alquerque-12 game is not immensely old.  

So far historians have not written exclusively about the Alquerque-12 game played in the world. Volumes I and II will be the first books in the world dedicated solely to this game. In volume III I will deal with the historical text of the Alquerque-12 game.

Writing this type of books is only possible if people are prepared to collaborate. In all these years I have been lucky to get full collaboration of more than 200 people, among them many Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian archaeologists and photographers.  Even a pilot helped me by giving photographs of very small villages. I give warm thanks to all of them. I hope I remember to mention all of them in the list I prepared at the end of this book.