2013 (First edition)
Govert Westerveld
The History of Alquerque-12. Spain and France.
Volume I
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/moriscoricote
FOREWORD
Govert
Westerveld
Years ago, I
looked around in the Ricote Valley for alquerque-12 drawings. The Ricote Valley has always been a chance
for me to relax, unwind and escape the stress of everyday life. The
pressures of commuting and family
obligations mean many of us live life in a constant hurry resorting to fast
food before collapsing in front of the
television in the evening. However, for my research I feel the need to escape
and get away from it all at times. The Ricote Valley has become a part of my life where I have the freedom to
slow down, get away from technology overload and take real pleasure from the
basics of life.
However, during years
I was not successful with my research in the Ricote Valley. This situation that
lasted several years changed suddenly when I met the archaeologist Joaquín
Salmeron, director of the Museum Siyasa at Cieza of the province of Murcia in
Spain. Cieza is located only 5 km from the Ricote Valley.
With great enthusiasm
Mr. Salmeron showed my proudly the different Alquerque boards they had found in
the moorish settlement known as Siyasa of the XIII century. Among them quickly
found two Alquerque-12 drawings. That day I felt myself the luckiest man of
Spain because suddenly all my research efforts were rewarded with the desired results.
The Alquerque-12 game
is the precursor of the draughts or checker game that is called in Spanish the
"Juego de las Damas". I have
already studied for many years the history of the draughts game that I
considered being a Spanish invention around 1495, precisely in the town of
Valencia.
Apart from that I
considered that the new powerful Dama (French: Dame) in the game of chess and draughts was nothing
else than a representation of Isabelle of Castile (Isabel la Católica) on the
chess and draughts board. Today most historian agree to that, but the Dutch
draughts researcher, Dr. Arie van der Stoep cannot agree to that due to etymological
findings. According to him the draughts game is an invention of France. The
same opinion he is applying for the
Alquerque-12 game, that according to his knowledge was a very popular game in
France before the XVI century. Furthermore,
he stated that players used a Dama
in the Alquerque-12 game,
although this rule was not mentioned in the book of Alfonso X The Wise
(1283). Dr. Van der Stoep came to this conclusion after having played the game
by computer.
Seeing that the first
Spanish draughts book was printed in 1547 in Valencia, and the first French
draughts book in 1668, I cannot believe in a French invention for the draughts
game. I invited Dr. Van der Stoep to proof with archaeological findings that
the Alquerque-12 was very popular in France, but according to this historian I
should have known that something like that could not be realized. I was not
happy with all the scientific explanations of
Dr. Van der Stoep. Therefore, I
have tried to investigate the archaeological findings of the Alquerque-12 game
in French and Spain because I do not
believe that the Alquerque-12 game was very popular in France before the XV
century.
In this book, you will now find the results of my work with
regards to Spain and France. The Alquerque-12
drawings were found in 98 places of Spain, whereas the results in France were
only 10 drawings. With other words, the
game was not popular at all in France.
The description
of the game of Alquerque-12 still is in
an awful situation because we have many Alquerque types and each game has its
own history. King Alfonso the Wise did already let us know in 1283 that there were the Alquerque-3, Alquerque-9
and the Alquerque-12 games. Therefore, the historical explication of the
Alquerque-12 game cannot be given on a general way. However, we constantly
see archaeologists and historians giving
in publications a general description, in which they include the Alquerque-12
game:
"The origin of the game of alquerque possibly dates back to the Bronze Age: figures known
as "Tiras" have been found engraved on rocks in the Alpine
region, especially near the Lake of Garda. In ancient Egypt: we find boards drawn on stone blocks that form the roof of the Temple of Kurna in the city of Luxor, dated to about 1400 BC. As from the
historical period they appear on the Galician rocks such as Maia or Baiona and
from the Roman world we know the exemplars of Mulva (Sevilla). Others state that it is thought to have originated in the Middle East."
So experts let us think that the Alquerque-12
game is coming from the Ancient Egypt and Roman world. Other historians follow
Dr. Van der Stoep and try to convince us that the game was extremely popular in
France; much more than in Spain. Basing
themselves on etymology, historians even dare to assert that the present
checkers (draughts) game developed in France
and that it came there from the
Alquerque-12 game. So in the internet we see, for example, the
following statement:
Alquerque
had been played in ancient Egypt more than 3000 years ago, and it was brought
to Europe in the 8th century by Moor warriors. This game was an inspiration for
contemporary, and very popular around the world, Checkers.
Who is
the person who is responsible partially for these nice stories? This is nobody else
than the famous boardgame specialist Harold James Ruthven Murray (1868 – 1955). In 1952 Murray published “A History of Board Games other than Chess”,
proposing the theory that alquerque-12 originated in Egypt and the draughts
game in France. Since his famous book about the History of Chess in
1913, everybody believed what the great
board specialist Murray was saying because he was and continue being one of the
greatest board game specialists. Many historians believe that Murray is
infallible, but this idea will only paralyze future work of others.
Being aware of the
fact that till now there still exists some confusion about the alquerque-12
game, I have concentrated myself this time on the history of this boardgame.
Again we see that Spain has an important history of this game, too. For that
reason, I try to explain in my books
about the history of the alquerque-12
game together with notes on the draughts game in order to refute Murray. It is
quite clear that there are still some historians who do not believe in Isabelle
of Castile. I am quite sure that the same will happen with my history of the
alquerque-12 game. On the other hand, I
am also pretty sure that there will be other historians who will improve my
points of view and that, in the future,
I will receive the same fate as Murray. However, this is the outcome of
research, where we all are interested in seeing on the end the full true.
The Spanish history
of the alquerque-12 game is so important that it is worthwhile to have some
books written about this game. Therefore,
I hope that my book will provide a great confusion among the historian of
draughts. At the same time, I hope that
Spanish archaeologist will template with other eyes this game. When reading
this book it will appear to the reader that the Alquerque-12 game is not
exceptionally old.
Till now historian did not write
exclusively about the Alquerque-12 game. With other words, this first volume
will be the first book in the world dedicated solely to this game. In another
volume, I will deal about other
countries where players use this game. Finally, a third volume will be only
about the historical texts of
Alquerque-12.
The
writing of this type of books is only possible if people are prepared to
collaborate. In all these years, I was lucky to get full collaboration of more
than 100 persons, among them many Spanish archaeologists and photographers. Even a pilot helped me in giving photographs
of very small villages. A word of thank to all of them. I hope I do not forget
any of them in the list I prepared at the end of this book.
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