Children's Games for a Medieval Fair

Fierges

• Very similar to checkers, Fierges is thought to have evolved out of the Arabic game Alquerque. Using an 8-by-8 square checker board, two players place twelve game pieces on the dark squares leaving the two middle rows open. For game pieces children may use coins or smooth stones, as long as the pieces of one player can be differentiated from the other. The game is played following the same rules as the modern game of checkers, the object of the game being to capture all of the opponent's twelve pieces.

Nyout

• A Nyout board is composed of small circles, or dots, arranged in the shape of a large circle divided by a cross. Each dot represents a playing space, and the circles in the center and at each of the four points of the cross are the cardinal points. Players attempt to move their four game pieces, called horses, onto the board then to move them counterclockwise around the board and off again. As players move their horses around the board they can take shortcuts through the middle, if they land on a cardinal space, and may choose to create a "team" out of two horses if they land on a space occupied by one of their own pieces.

Queek

• This simple game requires only a checkered cloth or chessboard and an assortment of pebbles. The cloth or board is set at a distance on a flat surface and the children take turns tossing a pebble onto the board, first calling out whether they think the pebble will land on a light or a dark space. Having the highest number of correct guesses indicates the winner who may be rewarded with a prize. The winner of the game may also be awarded the honor of selecting the next game.

Wari

• The contemporary version of this game is known as Mancala and it is played with a board that features two rows of six hollowed out cups and two wider cups, called reservoirs. Forty-eight game pieces are gathered from small colored stones or shells and divided equally among the cups, four pieces in each of the twelve cups. Players take turns removing all the pieces from one of the cups on their side and depositing them, one at a time, in the other cups, moving around the board in a counterclockwise direction. The goal of the game is to capture the opponent's pieces and place them in the player's own reservoir. When one side of the game board is empty, players count up the pieces in their reservoir. The player with the most pieces wins.