MARBLE GAMES MANCALA HOW TO
Now that you know how to play this classic, ancient game, you’ll need to find a game set! Hit Trophy has a delightful and affordable mancala set that would make an ideal gift for your family or friends. As with many math-based games involving strategy, mancala is fun and educational for the whole family.
In fact, this ancient game is fabulous for helping children develop counting skills and the ability to predict moves and think ahead. There are not many rules to remember, but a strategy is needed! After playing a few times, you will learn what sequence of moves will help you earn extra turns, capture your opponent’s pieces, and preserve your stones for the end of the game. The player with the most stones wins the game!Īs you can see, mancala is clean and simple in form. Each player counts the number of pieces in their large pit.The other player gets to take all the remaining stones on his or her side and place them into their store, or mancala.The game ends when one player has emptied the six pits of stones on their side of the game board.
If the last stone in a player’s hand is placed in an empty pit on his or her side of the board, then the player gets to capture all the stones in the pit directly across from it! When stones are captured, they are added to the player’s large mancala.If the last stone in a player’s hand is placed in his or her large pit, then the player earns an extra turn.Players never place stones in their opponent’s mancala.Īs the pieces are deposited around the board, there are a couple of special rules to follow: Players will always place a stone in their large pit but will skip over the large pit of his or her opponent.Player 2 will do the same, choosing a pit from the row in front of him or her and redistributing the stones in the pits, going in a counter-clockwise direction.Next, the player will transfer the stones, one at a time, in each pit going in a counter-clockwise direction until they are all gone. Player 1 will select one of the six pits directl y in front of him or her and remove all four pieces. The large pits, or mancalas, should be empty to start the game. Put four game pieces in each of the twelve small pits before beginning the game.The person with the most pieces in his or her mancala at the end of the game wins. The object of the game is for each player to get as many game pieces as possible in his or her large pit. The large pit to each player’s right is his or her mancala, or store.Place the game board horizontally, so that each player has six pits in front of them and so the players are facing each other.Here are the rules for playing mancala: Game Set-Up Looking for a game that will entertain a child with a short attention span? Play mancala! Need a brain break at work? Keep a mancala set on your desk and use it to help clear your mind. And here’s a bonus: mancala doesn’t take that much time to play! You can complete a game in less than fifteen minutes. Mancala is an easy game to learn and play, making it fun for people of all ages and stages. Rather than seeds or stones, modern mancala games use glass or plastic pebble-shaped pieces or marbles for game play. The game board consists of twelve small pits with two large pits (mancalas) at either end of the board. Nowadays, mancala boards are often crafted from wood or plastic, but the concept is the same. In a nutshell, game pieces are moved from one pit to the next, and the person with the most pieces in his or her large pit (or mancala) at the end of the game, wins. According to the Oxford Dictionary, the Arabic word manqala means a “(device designed for) transfer (of board-game pieces from one position to another)” and the word naqala means to transfer, remove, or relocate. Originally, people would dig little pits into the ground to make the game board and then use seeds or stones as the game pieces. Mancala is often referred to as a “seed and pit” game. Needless to say, this game has long-lasting appeal for people of all ages and backgrounds!
The game became popular throughout Arabia, Africa, and Asia and spread from there. History of the GameĪctually, if you thought that mancala was a character from The Lion King, you weren’t that far off! Archaeologists have found evidence of mancala games going back thousands of years in the region of North Africa and the Mideast. Despite being a game that has stood the test of time, many people still aren’t familiar with this entertaining pastime. Pronounced man-KAH-la, mancala is an easy-to-learn game that has been around for centuries. After all, mancala sounds more like the name of a character from Disney’s The Lion King than anything else, right?
Manca…what? If you have no idea what mancala is, you’re not alone.
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