''Ka-Bala'' was a talking board

game A game is a structured form of play (activity), play, usually undertaken for enjoyment, entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator s ...

manufactured and released by

Transogram Transogram was an American producer of toys, games and other leisure products from the early 20th century to 1971. It is best known for such long-produced games as Tiddledy Winks and Game of India, as well as such baby-boomer favorites as Green Gho ...

in 1967. It was marketed under the slogan, "The Mysterious Game that Tells the Future." The game was molded out of green plastic that glowed in the dark. It sat upon a hemispherical rocker, and was operated by the players touching the "solary projectors", which were handles on either side of the game. Unlike most talking boards which are activated by a

planchette A planchette ( or ), from the French for "little plank", is a small, usually heart-shaped flat piece of wood equipped with two wheeled casters and a pencil-holding aperture pointing downwards, used to facilitate automatic writing. The use of ...

, ''Ka-Bala'' used a large black

marble Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or Dolomite (mineral), dolomite. Marble is typically not Foliation (geology), foliated (layered), although there are exceptions. In geology, the ...

as an indicator; the marble ran around a circular track on the surface of the game. In addition to indicating the letters and numbers printed around the track, the marble could also be used to select one of twenty-two

Major Arcana The Major Arcana are the named or numbered cards in a cartomantic tarot pack, the name being originally given by occultists to the trump cards of a normal tarot pack used for playing card games. There are usually 22 such cards in a standard 78-car ...

cards of occult tarot supplied with the game. Each tarot card had the

fortune Fortune may refer to: General * Fortuna or Fortune, the Roman goddess of luck * Luck * Wealth * Fortune, a prediction made in fortune-telling * Fortune, in a fortune cookie Arts and entertainment Film and television * ''The Fortune'' (1931 film) ...

it predicted printed on the back. The game also had the twelve

zodiac signs In Western astrology, astrological signs are the twelve 30-degree sectors that make up Earth's 360-degree orbit around the Sun. The signs enumerate from the first day of spring, known as the First Point of Aries, which is the vernal equinox. ...

marked along the track; these could be used to generate a simple horoscope. In the center of the rocking board, the " Eye of Zohar" was mounted; this plastic eyeball would spin as the board was agitated by the players. The name "Ka-Bala" and the reference to the ''

Zohar The ''Zohar'' ( he, , ''Zōhar'', lit. "Splendor" or "Radiance") is a foundational work in the literature of Jewish mystical thought known as Kabbalah. It is a group of books including commentary on the mystical aspects of the Torah (the five ...

'' indicate that the game was supposedly related to

Kabbalah Kabbalah ( he, קַבָּלָה ''Qabbālā'', literally "reception, tradition") is an esoteric method, discipline and Jewish theology, school of thought in Jewish mysticism. A traditional Kabbalist is called a Mekubbal ( ''Məqūbbāl'' "rece ...

, an esoteric school of thought in

Jewish mysticism Academic study of Jewish mysticism, especially since Gershom Scholem's ''Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism'' (1941), distinguishes between different forms of mysticism across different eras of Jewish history. Of these, Kabbalah, which emerged in 1 ...

. As they operated the game, the players were instructed to chant ''Pax, sax, sarax; hola, noa, nostra!''

External links

''Ka-Bala''
at the online Museum of Talking Boards. Board games introduced in 1967 Divination software and games {{board-game-stub

See also

External links