CHINESE GAMES WITH DICE AND DOMINOES. 



531 



Avho presented tbeni to the Emperor Hwui tsung', and that tlie game 

 with its explauatiou was locked in the imperial treasury and first came 

 into general use iu the reign of Hwui-tsung's sou, Kao-tsung (1127-11G3 

 A. D.). 



Mr. Karl Himly * cites Kanghi's Dictionary as saying that according 

 to general tradition dominos were invented iu the second year of 

 Siuen-ho (1120) and circulated abroad by imperial order at the time of 

 Kao-tsung. 



Mr. Chatto t quotes the other great Chinese dictionary of the last 

 century, the Ohing tsz' t'ung, on the authority of Mr. Samuel Birch, as 

 saying that the cards now known in China as " Teen-tsze-pae" {tim tsz^ 

 p'di), or "dotted cards," were invented in the reign of Siuen-ho, llL'O, 

 and that they began to be common iu the reign of Kao-tsung. 



Mr. W. H. Wilkinson has recently show:' |that in the citation iiuule 

 by Chatto from the Ching tsz' tuiig, he 



omits the concluding and most important ^T'^ ->/" 



sentence: "Itidoes not follow that this class vm ^-4>-. ^^ 



of games originated in the period Hsiiau-ho," 

 and says that the passage, adduced again 

 and again by European writers to prove 

 that cards (dominoes) \vere first invented iu 

 the reign of Siuen-ho, when carefully "-ex- 

 amined, distinctly declares that such a con- 

 clusion would be unsound. 



"It is perfectly clear," Mr. Wilkinson says, "that 

 all that was done or asked lor in 1120 was an imperial 

 decision as to which of several forms of T'ieu-kiu 

 (Heavens and Nines) was to be considered orthodox. 

 The game iind the cards must have been in existence 

 long before. The passage from the Cheng-tza-t'nng 

 runs thus: 'Also ya p'ai, now the instruments of a 

 game. A conuuon legend states that m the second 

 year of the Hslian-ho, in the Sung dynasty 

 (1120 A. D. ), a certain official memorialized the 



throne, praying that the ya p'ai (ivory cards) might be fixed as a pack of 32, 

 comprising 127 pips (sic, it should be 227, but Chinese printers are careless), in order 

 to accord with the expanse of the stars and constellations. The combination, 

 'Heaven,' (6—6, 6 — 6) consisted of two pieces, containing 24 pips, figures of the 24 

 solar periods; ' earth ' (1 — 1, 1 — 1) also composed of two pieces, but contained 4 pips, 

 the four points of the compass — east, west, south and north; ' man' (4 — 4, 4 — 4) two 

 pieces, containing 16 pips, the virtues of humanity, benevolence, propriety and wis- 

 dom, fourfold; 'harmony' (1 — 3, 1 — 3) two pieces of eight pips, figuring the lireath 

 of ' Harmony' which pervades the eight divisions of the year. The other combina- 

 tions had each their names. There were four players having 8 cards apiece for their 

 hand, and the cards won or lost according as the number of the pips was lessor 

 more, the winner being rewarded with counters. In the time of Kao-tsung 



* Zeitschnft der deutscher Morgenliindischen Gesellschaft, Band 43, p. 451. 



t Facts and Speculations on the History of Playing Cards. London, 1848, p. 55. 



tThe American Anthropologist, Jan., 1895, vol. viii.. No. 1, p. 66. 



