#1 of 3 The Royal Game of Goose, history, game board stamp project.

 

I am re trying to carve a goose board print block. It will be a solid one not the many mini blocks put together. I think I can only do 2 squares at a time by hand, my hands cannot handle more. The limits of EDS (Ehlers Danlos Syndrome) means if I limit this work that I might be able to do the work everyday with out missing too many days in-between. If it turns out too much for my hands I will switch to working on it every other day. I have plans every weekend for the next 3 weekends

How  I am making this stamp.

I have graphite paper. I traced the period board through the paper it is printed on by putting it on a window to see though this is so I am working in the reverse. Stamps have to be carved in reverse so when you stamp they are facing the correct way. Folks that use printing presses have and had to be able to read upside down and backwards. 

I took the paper with the reverse board on it and then lay that on the rubber with Graphite paper between them. Then draw over the lines yet again.

I use wood working tools and exacto knives and linoleum carving tools to carve this rubber block. Despite it being rubber not a fruit wood or metal, my hands have a tough time, the curves and fiddly bits around numbers are especially hard. My hands start to ache after 2 squares so far. If I work a 3rd I find I get sloppy because I lose control of the tools. And you can't put material back as such I am only working 2 spaces a day.

This board has been on my todo list for a while I made it once on 6 small blocks glued together and I felt it was too sloppy. Since I am showing my Game of Goose research at TOA I would really like to have a board that I made to possible demonstrate. That is a period board design I am attempting to copy.

And while this board is out of period it is plain enough for me to attempt to carve it believing to be printed between 1750- 1775. Has the same spirit as the early boards.

http://www.giochidelloca.it/scheda_stampabile.php?id=850








3 most important pieces for this research
1st mention 1480ca advent sermon--------------------------Dominican Gabriele da Barletta Frier
oldest board 1500-1550ca Museum of art NYC-----------Board made of ebonized wood, shell & gem                                                                                                stones
oldest set of written rules 1598ca British Museum--------Plate printing with Rules in Italian printed on it

The Game of Goose 
According to Adrian Seville considered the expert of Game of Goose. 
The earliest mention of the board game that can be found is in a book of sermons by the Dominican friar Gabriel da Barletta in 1480 Advent Sermon by Barletti, G Sermons. The 1577 edition Mentioned playing the game over Advent, and please for the sake of aging eyesight of any have a second set of larger dice. Also making mention of the trick taking game Tarot as well as Goose. He considered both games to be accepted able and at the same time calling to mention that if Merriment must happen let wholesome games be played. 
Barletta probably dies c.1500
This source is in hand written Italian or Latin and is scanned in to a public church data base that has Many hundred of his sermons and is challenging to search. As such I am left to trust Seville word and his translator Thierry Depaulis of the first edition (Brescia,1497-98) the Royal Game of Goose Seville,A 2016) 
Seville has other books on Goose as well.
I found the sermon book online it however is scanned in it is in hand written Italian and is hard to read. even if I could read Italian  or Latin so I have to trust the authorities on the subjects.

The common situation for print is listed for the Royal Game of Goose (Jeu de l'Oie, Gioco dell'Oca) mentioning the game having its roots in Italy of Francesco de'Medici(1574-87) who is said [Carrera 1617], sent it as a present to King Philip III of Spain.
Many online and printed sources miss quote and say this is the oldest citation and set this as the creation date for the game.

The yet found oldest surviving Goose board is a 16th century board currently owned by the NYC MET Museum.
It follows a Italian printed design. It is made of Ebonized woo, with inlay of Ivory, horn and gold wire in a style associated with 16th century Gujarat in India.
The numbers and the spaces are in a 15th century Italian script. This suggests that it was made in Gujarat to an Italian Design. This board is lacking 2 of the common Hazard spaces, the Inn and the Bridge. The prison hazard space is a boat in the form of a Venetian galley. Though some other surviving Goose boards have a boat this is the only one with this type of boat found to date. A boat represents penal sentencing to serve time in a ship or boats galley in stead of a prison.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/120017999

The oldest example of a printed board with rules on it is held by the Trustees of the British Museum. An early Italian Game of Goose printed by Lucchino Gargano and dated to 1598 on a plate this plate has rules and is the oldest set of written rules I know of at this time..  
https://www.bmimages.com/preview.asp?image=00017738001  







Bibliography

de Montferrat del la Meslaya, Guy – editor
Indoor Games (or How to While Away a Siege)
The Compleat Anachronist No. 4
The Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc.
Copyright 1983
Printed 1995
Page 35

Smith, Patrick J.
Period Pastimes
 Being a Timeline of Games, with Instructions and Commentary on Selected Games Played
 in Medieval Europe
The Compleat Anachronist # 71
The Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc.
Copyright 1994
Pages 32 – 33

Hather, Jon
Historic Board and Dice Games, Roman to 1800
Gothic Green Oak
Copyright 2019
Pages 24 – 25

Seville, Adrian
The Royal Game Of The Goose
 400 Years of Printed Board Games
The Grolier Club
Copyright 2016

Salaamallah the Corpulent
Medieval Games
Jeffrey A. DeLuca
Copyright 1995
Page 105

Bell, R. C.
Board and Table Games from Many Civilizations
Revised Edition
Dover Publications, Inc.
Copyright 1960, 1969
Published 1979
Pages 14 – 16

Bell, R C
The Boardgame Book
The Knapp Press
Copyright 1979
Page 140

Grunfeld, Frederic V. – editor
Games of the World
 How to Make Them
 How to Play Them
 How They Came to Be
Hold, Rinehart and Winston
Copyright 1975
Pages 127 – 130

Botermans, Jack
The Book of Games
 Strategy, Tactics & History
Translated from the Spanish by Edgar Loy Frankbonner
Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.
Copyright 2006
Published 2008
Pages 141 - 152

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