What is Alea Evangelii?
Alea Evangelii, Latin for "the game of the gospels", is the largest tafl game known. It is played here on a 19×19 board as H. J. R. Murray reconstructed it: 48 attackers against 24 defenders and the king, who starts on the throne in the centre. Instead of compact blocks, the pieces start in small groups spread over the whole board, many of them close to the edges.
The rules are those of the standard game: the attackers move first, every piece moves like a rook, pieces are captured between two enemies or an enemy and the throne or a corner, and the king wins by reaching a corner. He is captured on four sides, or on three beside the throne.
On a board this size the corners are far from the king, and the opening is a long struggle in which the attackers try to link their scattered groups into lines before the defenders break through.
Rule changes
| Rule | Standard Tablut | Alea Evangelii |
|---|---|---|
| Board | Standard Tablut9×9 squares. | Alea Evangelii19×19 squares. |
| Pieces | Standard Tablut16 attackers against 8 defenders and the king. | Alea Evangelii48 attackers against 24 defenders and the king. |
| Starting position | Standard TablutAttackers in a T of four on each edge; defenders two deep on each side of the king. | Alea EvangeliiMurray's symmetrical layout: small groups of attackers spread round the board, defenders in rings around the king. |
| Moves, captures and goal | Standard TablutRook moves, custodial captures, a hostile throne and corners, escape to a corner. | Alea EvangeliiThe same. The other options in the table setup work on this board too. |
History
The game is known from a diagram and two pages of Latin explanation in a Gospel book at Corpus Christi College, Oxford (MS 122). The manuscript is written in an Irish hand and dated to the 11th or 12th century. Its text says that the game was invented at the court of King Æthelstan of England, who reigned from 924 to 939, by a Frank and Israel the Grammarian, and that Dub Innse, bishop of Bangor, who died in 953, brought it to Ireland.
The manuscript presents the board as an allegory of the Gospels: the corners and borders stand for the four Evangelists, and the groups of pieces for the canon tables of Eusebius. It does not say which pieces belong to which side. H. J. R. Murray identified the diagram as a tafl board in A History of Board-Games other than Chess (1951) and made it symmetrical. Because other tafl games give the attackers twice as many pieces as the defenders, 48 attackers and 24 defenders are commonly assumed. In the manuscript the pieces stand on the points where the lines cross; here they stand on squares.