Liubo

Liubo, or Liupo (Chinese:六 博; pinyin: liù bó, meaning: Six bars ), was an ancient Chinese board game. It was popular from about 1500 BC to 600 AD.

Game board

After Röllicke are for the game when you drag the twelve曲 道, qūdào, angle paths ' most important. These are - as 139 BC in the book Huainanzi described - after the cosmological system二 绳 四 钩, èrshéng Sigou, 2 Ropes - 4 hooks ' arranged (see also Chinese compass and Lo Pan). The one "rope" connecting South and North, the other connects East and West. The 4 " angle", link the two cardinal points, here labeled according Röllicke (ibid.):

• " the cyclic intermediate results of the lunar months ( divided in half to six in accordance with the six yin and six yang of the tone scale ),
• The phases of the earth consisting of twelve years, Jupiter cycle,
• The location of the Star Homes as well as the
• Marks which is fixed at twelve phases of each day ".

In this way the sky ( circle) on the earth (square) is projected.

Game utensils

In two archaeological finds there were so-called " end tablets ," the minutely all the grave goods list ( Mawangdui and Fenghuangshan ):

The " six sticks " ( split bamboo tubes; known from other finds ) are not listed!

Game rules

The game rules are not known. In the literature it is sometimes called a played with dice war game as well as an ordinary board game described. Presumably, rules and the character of the game have changed considerably over the years. The pieces are usually as fish, stones and owls, rare as generals and peasants called (similar to chess ). The Chinese scholar Lien -shen Yang has tried to reconstruct the rules. In his opinion, Liubo was played by two players, each with six blocks and six bars.