PETTEIA / LATRUNCULI: History and How to Play

[@Kaepsele337]

I've tried this game and variants in self play and none are satisfactory. Either because of boring gameplay resulting in a draw, or because the rules seem disconnected from the historical sources (Such as the Ulrich Schädler variant). The Kowalski variant seems closer to the evidence, but only results in draws, because a player can just make blocks or enclose empty territory in order to make immortal groups. This last point however lead me to come up with my own extra rule, which I think makes sense and leads to interesting gameplay. The rule is that you don't fight to kill the enemy army, but instead to enclose as much territory as possible, like in Go. This would also fit nicely with the translation of the Varro text: "the contest is waged to a finish with glass soldiers, so that white checks the black pieces, and black checks white." and "...This one moves towards higher results, so that, quickly played and breaking the opponent’s defensive line, it may burst out on his forces and, when the rampart is down, devastate the enclosed city." With the "enclosed city" representing a large territory. In playing myself it seems like a fun game. Here are the rules I suggest: 1. The game is played on a board of squares, of any size the players have to hand. 8 rows of 8 squares is the most convenient for today's players. 2. The pieces are laid out on the board as follows: each player has enough pieces to fill two rows of the board; each player's pieces are placed in the two rows nearest to him; 3. The players decide between them, at random or by agreement, who is to have the first turn. 4. A player in his turn moves a single piece from one square to another. All pieces move as far as the player wishes, in a straight line horizontally or vertically. 5. A piece cannot land on, nor jump over, another. 6. An enemy piece is captured by trapping it between two of the player's own pieces, in a straight line horizontally or vertically; the captured piece is immediately removed from the board; 7. If a moving piece traps two or three enemies between separate comrades, then those two or three enemies are all captured. 8. It is permissible, however, for a piece to voluntarily place itself between two enemies without harm. 9. Fields that are only surrounded by pieces of one player are the territory of that player. The pieces themselves count as part of the territory. 10. The game end when one player has enclosed more than half of the board, thus winning the game. 12. The game also ends when one player has fewer than eight pieces. That player loses the game. 13. If each player enclosed exactly half of the board, the player that didn't start wins. Rules 1-8 have been taken from cyningstan. Rules 9 to 13 have been added by me. If anyone wants to playtest this variant, feel free to contact me. PS: I've commented this before, but my previous comment seems to have been removed, probably because it contained external links. Sorry if both show up and I'm spamming.

[@ancientgaming4698]

Hello Guest6265+ ! I have seen both this and the previous comments you posted, but did not have time to answer, probably because of the issue you mention about including external links. I will take the chance to comment on your previous comments, which I found really interesting (a pitty they got removed): I 100% agree that today's Petteia/Latrunculi variations are detached enough from our sources to consider them different games and also share the feeling of unsatisfaction when playing an "artificial" modern version of an historical game (which somehow kind of kills the premise of the desire to play them in the first place). Unfortunatelly, we can only go as far with the sources we've got and think is worthwhile and fun in general to try come up with the closest variation anyway. I usually mention this in all of my videos, since most ancient games share the same issues (even back in the day!) and it is also because of this that I encourage you guys to come up with your own ideas, which is what you did. I love the variation you came up with, I had not considered looking at the game from a "Go perspective" but I find the idea extremely interesting and would be more than willing to give it a go! (pun NOT intended lol). Just by looking at the rules I do not know if I would enjoy it, since I would have to play them to get a better feeling, but they sure do look like fun!! :) I dont know how do you suggest we playtest it but feel free to send me a DM to instagram @ancientgaming_ludus and we can arrange everything there! :D Cheers!!

[@Breakfast_of_Champions]

Wikipedia hints at Fangqi games. Given the fact of parallel evolution of concepts in geographically disparate regions of the ancient world, there may be something to learn there to complete our reconstruction of Latrunculi.

[@rosarodriguezdelcerro8617]

Great!! Interesanting and beautiful place Complutum. The handcrafted pieces are amazing!! Can you tell us where to buy that Game?? I imagine we could play with chess pieces, but I'd like to buy the real game

[@ancientgaming4698]

Gratias tibi ago! :) The only set I know that you can buy online is the one from Masters Games, but you can probably find ocasional sets from smaller retailers. Aside from that, there is not much to be honest, most of what you can find is handcrafted or just uses regular checkers

[@Embercraftforge]

I think I'm going to try and make Petteia next, really interesting video!

[@gonzaloperegrin2840]

Love those mini romans and dacians! Keep like that mate, what a great channel

[@ancientgaming4698]

thank you :)!!

[@tonymaurice4157]

@@ancientgaming4698 I don't see how this game is playable.. and no one plays it today?

[@Madanth0ny]

Where can you buy it ?

[@associazioneclio9269]

Dear presenter, I'm thankful for the video. As a scholar, I feel the need to point out some mistakes: the connection of the Polis with ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians is purely fictional and is not supported by archaeological or bibliographic data. Also the idea that the Ludus Latrunculorum and its terminology overlapped with Chess is mistaken: when chess was introduced in Europe, Latruncoli were already in disuse for more than a half millennium. The most important aspect that need to be fixed, is that in both Petteia and Latruncoli, there was no special piece: any ancient source mention it, and any archaeological finding report the presence of a special piece that could be considered as a 'king' or a 'dux'. About the Ludus Latrunculorum, the most exhaustive and accurate scholarly production is the one of Ulrich Schädler. Most of the others are inaccurate or speculative. All the scholars who study ancient board games gather once a year at the Board Game Studies Colloquium. I warmly encourage you to join this meeting if you want to get in touch with the specialist in this field. Sincerely, Marco Tibaldini

[@ancientgaming4698]

A little more perspective on the etymology of the name - ludus latrunculorum - (courtesy of my dear friend and great latinist Jose María Sánchez): In the video, I briefly mention that this game is best translated as “the game of the soldiers”. There is some debate about this, and, while better than “the game of the thieves”, game of the soldiers is not a perfect translation either. "Latro" in Latin is not a thief, a pickpocketer, or a white-gloved thief, but something more of a "bandit", a "highway robber" (think of Robbin Hood). These groups of bandits sometimes had to face large military forces… which is the reason why they often had to develop strategies ("stratagemata") that could very well be in the origin of this Latin denomination. Furthermore, these bandits could, in many cases, be ex-soldiers or have some kind of military experience, so it was not strange that they would sometimes be seen as “milites”, or a kind of guerrilla. “The game of the bandits” (or “el juego de los bandoleros”, for my Spaniard folks) would be a nice translation as well.

[@smudgepost]

That's very good thank you. Some of the rule variations I've read include or omit the Centurion/Eagle piece and can win the game by capturing all the dogs OR the eagle. I guess all variations may have been played at some time to vary the results or just from word of mouth descriptions of game play

[@ancientgaming4698]

thank you :) there surely are many variations to it, its the downside of historical gaming, that we can never be 100% sure of certain rulesets. Guest6265+ above came up with a variation that is actually really fun to play and fairly balanced

[@tuber00009]

So glad to have discovered your channel bro

[@ancientgaming4698]

Likewise glad you discovered my channel!😄

[@ag-bf3ty]

Just leaving a like and comment for the old algorithm.

[@ancientgaming4698]

Thank you :D!!!!!! A heart of gold that of yours

[@sapalex5792]

Thanks!

[@tylermaitland8767]

link for the game pieces?

[@tonymaurice4157]

Something is missing from this game because it is prone to draws.. Unless a double row makes the complexity greater

[@ancientgaming4698]

Yeah this is indeed one of it's major criticisms. There are some modern variants that try to tackle that issue, but unfortunately we can not know much more from our sources. I have some times tried to think in possible solutions myself, it is always fun to see what people come up with

[@tonymaurice4157]

@@ancientgaming4698 I just can't see the ancient Greeks and Romans playing this game for hundreds of years, when it is constantly prone to repetitive draws! Unless there is a double row? Single row seems to be too repetitive. What do you think?

[@ancientgaming4698]

@@tonymaurice4157 That is a very good question actually, because it is not unique to Petteia/Latrunculi, but rather to the study of Ancient Games in general, let me explain [CHUNKY TEXT INCOMING!] To begin with, I do not think of this “game” as a static or a thoroughly defined set of rules. Petteia/latrunculi games are rather better understood as a category of games with shared elements that define them (mainly - orthogonal movement, custodian capture, grided board). Think as well that πεσσός / πεσσοῖσι referred mainly to the implements used, the pebbles, not necessarily a particular variant. With latrunculi, it was pretty much the same case (you can see this in how the name was still used to define chess even late in the Middle Ages). About what exactly were the rules for even one of such games is hard to know, if even possible, since our sources are limited, but that these games were played for hundreds of years by both Greeks and Romans I have no doubt about it. This is fairly well attested by many of our sources, some of which I do mention in the video, and range from classical Greece to the late Roman period. The key aspects here are again the defining mechanics of the category, which are indeed mentioned in most of our sources (both the older and the newer ones). Aside from that, you also have archeological evidence: carved grided boards are of course the most common by far, and you can find them in most of the fora (about this I talk a bit in my video “Gods & Gambles”), but arguably the more useful evidence is when we can link sets of pieces to boards, usually in burials. TLDR: you will not find the “canonical” way to play Ludus Latrunculorum, or Petteia for that matter, and all contemporary reconstructions that claim to represent that denomination (including this one, of course) include artificial rules and/or are biased towards some particular source/s in some way more than others. This may not sound like a satisfactory explanation, but that is because many people do also approach the study of ancient games in an anachronistic way; modern game industry is fairly standardized and our view/conception of what a game is, is also quite different. People in Antiquity did not use to write the rules of the games they played - this was common knowledge, you learned by playing with others basically. This however led to a wider variety of localized variants that often made difficult to define a particular game, and even stemmed different games altogether. A double row would work better? Perhaps, personally I do not think that solves the issue, but that is irrelevant, at least with regards to historicity. The game could work better with many other additions (the Dux is one of them), and we could go on to try make this game "playable", but that would just be our game, not theirs.

[@tonymaurice4157]

@@ancientgaming4698 I don't see this game as playable.. it is prone to too many repetitive draws. And there is no real strategy like in checkers and chess. I know checkers was re-engineered in the 14th century. From what I read

[@tonymaurice4157]

@@ancientgaming4698 what about the Ulrich rules? They had a placement phase and jumping.. seems to be less prone to draws

[@MrPleers]

The background music is very distracting.

[@ancientgaming4698]

It's my favourite track of the show, so I am a little biased lol

[@davidbennett9543]

I agree, you have made a in-depth and educational video, It would be incredible without the music.