Elizabethan Games

Elizabethan Card Games
Card Games were popular with anyone who like to gamble. The following card games were played by Elizabethans:

• One & Thirty - ancestors to modern Blackjack

• Ruff and Honors - Played in teams of four players

• Maw - A 16th-century trick-taking game for up to 10 players

Elizabethan Board Games
The following board games were played by Elizabethans:

• Chess

• Tables - Backgammon

• Nine Men's Morris

• Alquerques - A classic period strategy game, an ancestor of Checkers

• Fox & Geese - a game of strategy

• The Philosophers Game - a game of strategy and numbers

• Shove Ha'penny - a board game played with coins

• Shovelboard - the ancestor of shuffleboard

Elizabethan Dice Games
The following dice games were played by Elizabethans:

• Knucklebones - Early game of dice

• Hazard - an ancestor of Craps

Elizabethan Sporting Games
The following Sporting games were played by Elizabethans:

• Archery - Archery contests were extremely popular during the Elizabethan era

• Tag - Children's game of 'catch'

• Battledore and Shuttlecock - the ancestors of modern badminton

• Billiards

• Bowls

• Colf - the ancestor of Golf

• Gameball - a simple football game

• Hammer-throwing

• Hurling or Shinty - similar to hockey

• Horseshoes - throwing horseshoes at a target

• Pall Mall - an ancestor of Croquet

• Quarter-staff contests

• Rounders - a bat-and-ball game similar to the modern baseball

• Skittles -  an ancestor of modern ten-pin bowling

• Stoolball - an ancestor of Cricket

• Tennis

• Wrestling

Elizabethan Children's games
The following children's games were played by Elizabethans:

• Blind Man's Buff - a children's game but also played by adults!

• Hopscotch - Common children's game

• Marbles - Common children's game