Warri in the World

The Masai, who call the game 'Kiuthi', say that the 'sow and reap' game is the oldest game in the world, and was invented by Sindillo, son of the original man, Maitoumbe. They also say that the game's original name was not Kiuthi, or Warri, or Awele, or Mancala, but Geshe.
Even if the invention of Warri is not that close to the origins of the world, it is undoubtedly far enough in the past to make it one of the oldest games in existence. There are those who date it back to the Sumerians, who are supposed to have made a game out of the container and grains originally used to keep the accounts. However, the most likely birthplace of the game is Egypt, where boards in stone going back to 1500 BC, i.e. 3,500 years ago, have been found; in the temple of Kurna, at Thebes, examples with six, seven or eight holes have been discovered, while a Warri board is carved into the top of a pillar at the entrance to the temple at Karnak, and other carvings are to be found near the pyramid of Cheops and the temple of Luxor.
We can therefore assume that Warri started out at the head of the Nile and then took root in the Arab world, spreading over the centuries throughout the Orient, accompanying the expansion of Muslim culture and the paths followed by the trading caravans. For example, we find games similar to Warri in India, where it is called Tchuka Ruma; in Sri Lanka, where it is known as Pallanguli; in Borneo, where it is called Ot-Tijn, and in Indonesia, where it becomes Conglak; it reached as far as the Philippines, but above all it took over Black Africa. Other ancient examples of the board have been found in Zimbabwe, Uganda and in the Tarkora temple in Ghana. Splendid game boards, in some cases real African works of art, with representations of men and beasts and religious and/or ritual significance, can be seen in many African museums and some Western ones, such as the British Museum.
In its victorious passage through Africa, Warri diversified into hundreds of different variations, adapting to the customs and attitudes of different peoples, tribes and even villages, and took on still more names. In Shaba alone, the province of Zaire better known under its old name of Katanga, the 'sow and reap' game becomes Lisolo among the Babemba, Kisolo and Kisumbi among the Baluba and the Basanga, and Tshiela among the Tshokwe and the Lunda. Moving on to Nigeria, we discover that the Haussa call it Dara or Darra, the Yoruba Ayo, Ayoayo or J'erin (although children play J'odu), and the Ibo call it Ikwe or Okwe. The Senegalese know it as Wari, but it is called Adijto in Dahomey and Mwelso in Tanzania.

With the slave trade, Warri was 'exported' to the Americas, particularly to the Caribbean, the Antilles, Brazil and Louisiana, a cotton state in which negroes make up about half of the population. This has meant that the vast number of names and variations of the game has become a powerful tool in ethnic research: by observing how the descendants of those slaves play, we can trace their 'roots' (after the famous book by Alex Haley).
After having been ignored for centuries by Anglo-Saxons and Europeans, Warri has only now begun to achieve visibility in the United States and some European countries on the crest of the wave which has led to the rediscovery of games from other civilisations, ages and cultures. Patty A. Hardy, who has a Web site dedicated to Warri, recalls Oh-Wah-Ree, launched on the American market in '62 as an Egyptian game, and Mandinka, distributed at the end of the Seventies and advertised as "An ancient African strategical game". In Europe, English, Danish and Swedish games companies have been the main contenders in producing Warri game boards. In Italy, Dal Negro in Treviso has the game in its catalogue, with the board and pieces in wood, sold under the name of Awèlè Mancala.