It’s all Greek

Backgammon game reached Western Europe most probably through Mediterranean. A thousand years after the Egyptians were playing their version, the Greeks were playing a form of the game. Plato mentions a Greek form of the game and comments on its popularity. Sophocles attributes its invention to Palamedes, who was said to have beguiled away the time during the long siege of Troy by playing. Homer slightly mentions a Greek game in the Odyssey. Herodotus says that the Lydians invented it. In this and other dice games the Greeks obviously had feelings about lady luck just as strong as ours. They called sixes, which were good high rolls then as now, “Aphrodite”, and they called ones a word akin to “dog”.



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