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Three men's morris is an abstract strategy game played on a three by three board (counting lines) that is similar to
tic-tac-toe Tic-tac-toe (American English), noughts and crosses (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English), or Xs and Os (Canadian English, Canadian or Hiberno-English, Irish English) is a paper-and-pencil game for two players who ta ...
. It is also related to six men's morris and
nine men's morris Nine men's morris is a strategy board game for two players, dating back to at least the Roman Empire. The game is also known as nine-man morris, mill, mills, the mill game, merels, merrills, merelles, marelles, morelles, and ninepenny marl in Eng ...
. A player wins by forming a mill, that is, three of their own pieces in a row.


Rules

240px, A board for three men's morris. This pattern has been found carved into the roof of the temple of Kurna. Each player has three pieces. The winner is the first player to align their three pieces on a line drawn on the board. There are 3 horizontal lines, 3 vertical lines and 2 diagonal lines. The board is empty to begin the game, and players take turns placing their pieces on empty intersections. Once all pieces are placed (assuming there is no winner by then), play proceeds with each player moving one of their pieces per turn. A piece may move to any vacant point on the board, not just an adjacent one. According to H. J. R. Murray’s ''
A History of Chess ''A History of Chess'' is a book written by H. J. R. Murray (1868–1955) and published in 1913. Details Murray's aim is threefold: to present as complete a record as is possible of the varieties of chess that exist or have existed in differen ...
'', there is an alternative version in which pieces may not move to any vacant point, but only to any ''adjacent'' linked empty position, i.e. from a corner to the middle of an adjacent edge, from the middle of an edge to the center or an adjacent corner, or from the center to the middle of an edge. Murray calls the first version "nine holes" and the second version "three men's morris" or "the smaller merels". In this variant of the game, there is a
winning strategy Determinacy is a subfield of game theory and set theory that examines the conditions under which one or the other player of a game has a winning strategy, and the consequences of the existence of such strategies. Alternatively and similarly, "dete ...
for the player who goes first, unless the first player is not allowed to place the first piece in the centre, in which case neither player has a winning strategy.


History

According to R. C. Bell, the earliest known board for the game includes diagonal lines and was "cut into the roofing slabs of the temple at
Kurna Kurna (also Gourna, Gurna, Qurna, Qurnah or Qurneh; ) is a group of three closely related villages (New Qurna, Qurna and Sheikh Abd el-Qurna) located on the West Bank of the River Nile opposite the modern city of Luxor in Egypt near the Theban Hi ...
in Egypt"; he estimated a date for them of   BCE. However, Friedrich Berger wrote that some of the diagrams at Kurna include
Coptic cross The Coptic cross is any of a number of Christian cross variants associated in some way with Coptic Christians. Typical form The typical form of the "Coptic cross" used in the Coptic Church is made up of two bold lines of equal length that in ...
es, making it "doubtful" that the diagrams date to 1400 BCE. Berger concluded, "certainly they cannot be dated." When played on this board, the game is called ''tapatan'' in the
Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
and ''luk tsut k'i'' ('six man chess') in
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
. It is thought that ''luk tsut k'i'' was played during the time of
Confucius Confucius (; pinyin: ; ; ), born Kong Qiu (), was a Chinese philosopher of the Spring and Autumn period who is traditionally considered the paragon of Chinese sages. Much of the shared cultural heritage of the Sinosphere originates in the phil ...
, c. 500 BCE. Centuries later, the game was mentioned in
Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...
's ''
Ars Amatoria The (''The Art of Love'') is an instructional elegy series in three books by the ancient Roman poet Ovid. It was written in 2 AD. Content Book one of was written to show a man how to find a woman. In book two, Ovid shows how to keep her. These ...
'', according to R. C. Bell. In book III (c. 8 CE), after discussing , a popular board game, Ovid wrot

This, translated, says:
There is another game divided into as many parts as there are months in the year. A table has three pieces on either side; the winner must get all the pieces in a straight line. It is a bad thing for a girl not to know how to play, for love often comes into being during play.
Boards were carved into the
cloister A cloister (from Latin , "enclosure") is a covered walk, open gallery, or open Arcade (architecture), arcade running along the walls of buildings and forming a quadrangle (architecture), quadrangle or garth. The attachment of a cloister to a cat ...
seats at the English
cathedral A cathedral is a church (building), church that contains the of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, Annual conferences within Methodism, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually s ...
s at
Canterbury Canterbury (, ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, in the county of Kent, England; it was a county borough until 1974. It lies on the River Stour, Kent, River Stour. The city has a mild oceanic climat ...
,
Gloucester Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city, non-metropolitan district and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West England, South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean ...
,
Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. It lies by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. The population of the Norwich ...
,
Salisbury Salisbury ( , ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and civil parish in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers River Avon, Hampshire, Avon, River Nadder, Nadder and River Bourne, Wi ...
and
Westminster Abbey Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an Anglican church in the City of Westminster, London, England. Since 1066, it has been the location of the coronations of 40 English and British m ...
; the game was quite popular in England in the 13th century. These boards used holes, not lines, to represent the nine spaces on the board—hence the name ''nine-holes''—and forming a diagonal row did not win the game. The name of the game may be related to
Morris dance Morris dancing is a form of English folklore, English folk dance. It is based on rhythmic stepping and the execution of choreographed figures by a group of dancers in costume, usually wearing bell pads on their shins, their shoes or both. A ban ...
s (and hence to
Moorish The term Moor is an exonym used in European languages to designate the Muslim populations of North Africa (the Maghreb) and the Iberian Peninsula (particularly al-Andalus) during the Middle Ages. Moors are not a single, distinct or self-defi ...
). However, according to Daniel King, "the word 'morris' has nothing to do with the old English dance of the same name. It comes from the Latin word , which means a counter or gaming piece."


Related games

* Six men's morris and
nine men's morris Nine men's morris is a strategy board game for two players, dating back to at least the Roman Empire. The game is also known as nine-man morris, mill, mills, the mill game, merels, merrills, merelles, marelles, morelles, and ninepenny marl in Eng ...
use six and nine pieces, respectively, and are played on different boards. * In
tic-tac-toe Tic-tac-toe (American English), noughts and crosses (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English), or Xs and Os (Canadian English, Canadian or Hiberno-English, Irish English) is a paper-and-pencil game for two players who ta ...
, pieces are placed (or marks are made) until the board is full; if neither player has an
orthogonal In mathematics, orthogonality (mathematics), orthogonality is the generalization of the geometric notion of ''perpendicularity''. Although many authors use the two terms ''perpendicular'' and ''orthogonal'' interchangeably, the term ''perpendic ...
or diagonal line at this point, the game is a draw. * Extended tic-tac-toe, like the three men's morris game, each player has three pieces, but when moving pieces, players must first move their first pieces, then the second pieces, then the third pieces, then the first pieces, and so on. This game is harder than both tic-tac-toe and three men's morris, but the first player has a way to win by taking the edge first. Alternatively, by taking the center or corner first, the game will be drawn. * ''Tapatan'', from
Philippine The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...
, the same game with additional rule that pieces can only move to adjacent spaces. * ''Marelle'', from
France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
, the same game with additional rule that pieces can only move to adjacent spaces and the center space (central intersection point) cannot be used until after each player drops their first piece. * '' Tant Fant'', from
India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
, the same game with additional rule that pieces can only move to adjacent spaces and the pieces are already dropped before the game is started. * '' Achi'', from
Ghana Ghana, officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It is situated along the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, and shares borders with Côte d’Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, and Togo to t ...
, the same game with additional rule that pieces can only move to adjacent spaces, and each player has four (instead of three) pieces. * '' Picaria'', a Native American variation invented in New Mexico, adds diagonal attachments to the central edge points, yielding four additional interior points each located between the center and corner points, may have 9 or 13 spaces, the center space (central intersection point) cannot be used until after each player drops their first piece (a variant is the center space cannot be used after all pieces are dropped).


References


External links

* Pla
Three Men's Morris online
with another person as real-time browser game


Further reading

* {{Tic-Tac-Toe Morris games Solved games