Oware
Gather your family around the screen and play one of the oldest known board games in human history. Originating in West Africa, Oware is a game of deep strategy, calculation, and tradition.
History & Origins
Oware is a classic abstract strategy game belonging to the Mancala family of pit-and-pebble games. It is widely believed to have been created by the Ashanti people of Ghana, and is considered one of the oldest board games in the world, with roots potentially tracing back thousands of years.
The game holds deep cultural significance across West Africa. According to Ashanti legend, the game was invented so that a man and a woman could spend more time together—the word "Wari" is an Akan word related to marriage. Historically, it served as a vital social space and was featured in royal ceremonies.
During the transatlantic slave trade, the game was carried to the Caribbean, where it was preserved as an important piece of African cultural retention and continues to be played today under various names.
How to Play (Abapa Rules)
The Setup
The board has 12 pits. Player 1 controls the bottom 6 pits, and Player 2 controls the top 6. The game starts with 48 seeds, placing exactly 4 seeds in each pit.
Sowing (Moving)
On your turn, choose any pit on your side that contains seeds. Pick up all the seeds from that pit and distribute them one by one into the subsequent pits in a counter-clockwise direction. (If you pick up 12+ seeds, you skip the starting pit when you come back around to it).
Capturing
To capture seeds, two conditions must be met at the end of your turn:
- The very last seed you drop must land in an opponent's pit.
- That final seed must bring the total in that pit to exactly 2 or 3 seeds.
If both are true, you capture those seeds. Furthermore, you can capture in a backward cascade: if the pit right before the last one also belongs to the opponent and has 2 or 3 seeds, you capture those too, continuing backward until the chain breaks.
Winning
The game ends when a player captures at least 25 seeds, or if players agree to a draw when both have 24 seeds.