The early history of board games and their role in classical courtly culture has been a topic of sustained scholarly interest. This article will present a previously unknown and unexpected textual source that makes a substantial contribution to the question due to its date, context, and implications for ongoing research. Attention will be drawn to the difficult question of the evolution of literary traditions in early Sasanian Iran in order to demonstrate the discovery of a unique and major new source for the relevant disciplines. To survey the full range of texts, art, or material cultureFootnote ¹ from late antiquity relevant to the topic of backgammon, or the complex issue of the development of this and various related board games, the reader should consult the standard studies cited in the references.

It is necessary to start with a brief summary of the Middle Persian text The Explanation of Chess and the Invention of Backgammon (Wizārišn ī Čatrang ud Nihišn ī Nēw-Ardaxšīr), commonly dated to the sixth century ce and the reign of Ḵosrow (Xusrō) I.Footnote ² This work describes a kind of contest between the Persian and the Indian kings who are represented by their leading wise men. The famous sage Wuzurgmihr not only defeats his Indian counterpart at chess but he invents the game of backgammon, the board being given cosmological significance and the turning of the counters according to the roll of the die corresponding to the nature of fate. This is the culminating passage:Footnote ³

Let us consider the most important features of this account. First, the play of the game is compared to human fate, which by divine ordinance is governed by the planets and the stars. The taking away of pieces from the board and their return from outside the arena, and presumably the patterns of placement and vagaries of conjunction on the board, are understood as a reflection of our birth, death, and resurrection. This cosmological speculation was occasioned at least in part by numerology, i.e. twelve fields of play, like the months and the stars, on each side; thirty counters like the days and nights; the duality and contrast between the black and white pieces in opposition. Further, every backgammon player will be familiar with the experience of a sudden reversal of fortune; everything is set up and going right for you, then the tables are turned and disaster falls in an instant.

Second, there is the context in terms of competition between sages and the setting at the Persian court. Wuzurgmihr (elsewhere Bozorgmehr, about whom there developed a considerable literature in Persian and Arabic),Footnote ⁴ is the vizier of King Ḵosrow. The King of the Indians sends a set of chess and a challenge to explain the logic of that game or to submit to him by way of tribute and tax. The means by which the challenge can be tested is the explanation given by Wurzurgmihr and played out in a set of games between himself and the corresponding wise minister of the Indian king, Taxtrītos (or Tātarītos). The chess challenge successfully overcome, Wurzurgmihr acts for Ḵosrow in reply through what is presented as his own invention of backgammon, although notably he must remark that the game is named for the first Sasanian king as nēw-Ardaxšir.Footnote ⁵ This putative etymology, “Ardaxšir the valiant” (vel sim.), is thus supplied for its common name in Persian, i.e. nard or nardasīr interpreted as contractions of the former; the same then passed on into Arabic and other literatures.Footnote ⁶ Wurzurgmihr in turn travels to India where his victory as the wisest of the wise turns the tables and leads to tribute paid to Ērānšahr. The obvious points to bear in mind are the courtly context, the rivalry between India and Persia, the implied attribution back to the time of King Ardaxšir in the third century from the actual context of King Ḵosrow in the sixth, and the achievement of victory through wisdom.Footnote ⁷

Let us turn to the new text that has been discovered. It was identified during the ongoing collaborative project by Iain Gardner, Jason BeDuhn, and Paul Dilley to edit a large (c. 500 page) Coptic Manichaean codex on papyrus housed at the Chester Beatty Library and entitled The Chapters of the Wisdom of My Lord Mani.Footnote ⁸ The codex is in a very poor state, but it contains unique and early material of remarkable interest and this has justified endeavours to publish all that can be recovered. This particular passage occurs within the lengthy but crucial chapter 337, and it is necessary to explain the context so that the relevance of the passage becomes apparent.

The Coptic Manichaean Kephalaia corpus, to which this codex belongs, evolved with the addition of substantial blocks of material adapted to the controlling format of the genre.Footnote ⁹ That format requires the reduction of material to short chapters (i.e. Greek Kephalaia) that always begin with chapter number, header and a formulaic passage in which Mani himself, usually termed apostle or enlightener, is portrayed in a setting such as the community of his disciples, the royal palace, or a city temple. A question is presented, for instance by one of the catechumens or a noble, and utilized as the occasion for the teaching presented as a verbatim recording of Mani's speech, often in dialogue with his interlocutor. It is evident that the raw blocks of material were drawn from a variety of oral sources and perhaps prior literatures as well; but the constraints of the Kephalaia genre are largely artificial, the teachings have been heavily reworked, and their value as a direct record of Mani's own words is extremely limited. Nevertheless, it is possible to discern the development of Manichaean traditions about a vast range of topics, and one can attempt to recover something of the prior sources utilized. Further, the incidental details of toponyms, persons and ranks, festivals, and so on, transport the reader directly through the medium of a Coptic source circulated in late antique Egypt to the world of the early Sasanian empire. It is crucial to emphasize this. The settings are not fanciful although the direct historicity of the events is open to much interrogation. Here is to be found real information about the cities, government, social order, religious practices and the interaction of peoples at that time; albeit presented in a highly stylized and prejudicial fashion.

Number 337 is one of the longer and more disparate chapters in the work stretching from within codex page 390 to 400. However, given that the imposition of the kephalaiac structure is largely artificial it is more helpful to position it as belonging to a larger block of material that begins in chapter 327 (p. 364) and continues through number 340 (to p. 415). The narrative arc of these 50-plus pages of text tells a coherent story: when a wise man named GoundeshFootnote ¹⁰ is introduced, famous for his debates and victories in challenges against other philosophers at the palace of King Shapur, a meeting with the apostle Mani leads to the expected contest. The initial topic is the nature of good and evil; this is followed by a series of other questions, parables, and puzzles. In all of these Mani is triumphant, Goundesh learns wisdom and humility and comes to recognize his opponent as the greater sage without equal in the world; indeed, to recognize him as his master, the apostle of truth. Eventually Goundesh's own previous teacher, a certain Masoukeos, hearing of this conversion is angered, and himself comes to Shapur's palace to confront his pupil. It is whilst the two are together and joined by Mani that the event discussed below takes place; but first let us follow the narrative to its conclusion. Masoukeos challenges Mani with a question about the nature of the universe and the souls that enter in to it. Inevitably he too is defeated and recognizes that the apostle's wisdom surpasses all the wisdom in the world. In chapter 338 the series of contests between sages culminates with the introduction of another wise man from the east (i.e. India), greater than both Goundesh and Masoukeos. This is Iodasphes (the name clearly derives from bodhisattva as in the medieval romance of Barlaam and Ioasaph),Footnote ¹¹ who appears before Shapur and praises him as the greatest of kings and lord of a multitude of countries. There is no other kingdom equal to his kingdom. Yet, King Shapur lacks one thing: there is no one in his kingdom able to defeat Iodasphes in debate. At this point a member of the court named Kardel son of Artaban states that there is indeed one person in the realm who could debate and triumph over Iodasphes, that is the righteous Mani. The two sages debate the question of the eternity of the universe in the presence of Kardel and Goundesh until the apostle is successful. Iodasphes makes obeisance to him and recognizes him as Buddha. The cycle of stories is then brought to a conclusion with King Shapur himself giving Mani authority in his kingdom, the lengthy final testimony of Goundesh, and even the recognition of the apostle as father and master by the aristocrat Kardel, son of Artaban.

There is not the opportunity here to detail all the fascinating elements of this cycle and the various literary connections and echoes. The historicity of events such as Shapur's supposed recognition of Mani is not the issue. Here is found the theme of contest between sages and the use of traditional tales, some of which can be paralleled in known sources,Footnote ¹² but especially noting the cosmological content of the major debates; and also the context at the Sasanian court culminating with the visit of the wise Iodasphes from India. And one final point to emphasize: these are not simply stock themes and stories. The best example of a specific social and cultural setting to the narrative is the role of Kardel son of Artaban. Whilst the various sages other than Mani are unknown to history, this courtier is listed in the great inscription of Shapur I at Naqš-e Rostam, where he appears as Kirdīr the son of Ardavān in sixty-first place among the dignitaries of the king's reign.Footnote ¹³ This Coptic source is a translation of a text that took shape amongst the Manichaean communities of the early Sasanian empire at a very real point and place in history. This vital question of dating will be addressed at the end of the paper.

The episode of interest here is poorly preserved, but a sensitive and careful reading will draw out the essential points. To quote:Footnote ¹⁴

Mani critiques a conventional understanding of the play of the game in terms of the vagaries of cosmological fate. True knowledge of the universe, of the birth and death of persons, depends upon the wisdom given by God; and the entire theme of this codex is that it is Mani's role to reveal it. The movement of the counters is a dead thing in which there is no truth. Note that a relationship between fate, cosmology, and the backgammon game is the starting point of Mani's teaching: it is the accepted cultural norm that lies behind the entire vignette. His teaching reflects the basic features of backgammon games: the experience of reversal of fortune, of leaving the field of play and of returning to it, i.e. counters are withdrawn from the board and then returned to it, just as people “pass away” or enter the world anew.

The Coptic codex utilizes the loanword tabla. The standard lexical reference to the term in Greek to mean a gaming-table and as an early form of modern backgammon is the epigram recorded by Agathias in the sixth century and describing details of the Emperor Zeno's game of the same in the fifth.Footnote ¹⁹ Usage of the term in Greek to mean at least some form of dice-board can be tracked back to Apollonius writing about the Montanist heresy in Phrygia, the original lost but quoted by Eusebius in his Church History as railing against supposed prophets who play at “tables”;Footnote ²⁰ but it derives from the Latin tabula, and there is an entire area of study devoted to the history of this family of games.Footnote ²¹ Cognates are used in modern languages and many variations of play can be found in contemporary societies and cultures such as tavla in Turkey. What is apparent is that the Coptic translator of the Kephalaia codex found the word suitable for rendering whatever the original word was in the text brought by the Manichaean community to Roman Egypt. It does not help us to understand the exact form of the game supposedly played by Goundesh and Masoukeos at the palace of Shapur I, nor issues such as whether Persian nard was originally derived from India as (e.g.) Daryaee supposes, or from the Roman empire following (e.g.) Panaino.Footnote ²²

The matter of crucial interest is that the complex of literary references and themes previously known and associated with the sage Wuzurgmihr at the court of Ḵosrow I is now evidenced with regard to Mani at the palace of Shapur I. This is the third rather than the sixth century; and, furthermore, the newly-recovered episode opens wide not only the chronology and historical circumstances but the cultural and religious resonances of the narrative. Whilst the historicity of Wuzurgmihr has long been a matter of debate, he is an important figure in Iranian andarz literature and the Sasanian heritage transmitted into the medieval and Arabic worlds.

The date of the new text can be determined with some certainty. The Chester Beatty codex belongs to the so-called Medinet Madi library of Manichaean Coptic codices that first appeared on the Cairo antiquities market in 1929.Footnote ²³ The date of these works has generally been supposed to be c. 400 ce on the basis of palaeography, codicology, dialect, and the content of the texts. The codices contained original writings of Mani himself, such as his Epistles, and those of his early disciples and of the church, including homilies, psalms, historical material, and so on. All the works with some very minor additions (such as doxologies composed in Egypt) originate from Sasanian Mesopotamia and were originally composed in eastern Aramaic, but were translated into Lycopolitan Coptic perhaps in part through the medium of Greek. The books are almost entirely unique, in that neither the Aramaic originals nor translations in other languages are extant;Footnote ²⁴ the only true exceptions to this being some duplicates of psalms (also in Coptic) recovered by archaeological excavations at Ismant el-Kharab in the early 1990s. These can be securely dated to around the 360s ce and evidence a somewhat earlier stage of the redaction history to that found in the Medinet Madi Psalm-Book.Footnote ²⁵

This brief summary obviously contains many details that could be discussed at greater length. Each of the individual texts within the collection has its own history, and the various codices were not necessarily produced at one and the same time before being gathered together into the collection glossed as a “library” and thought to have been deposited at Medinet Madi in the Fayum for unknown reasons. Nevertheless, there is no reason to doubt the broad outline of the commonly accepted view that these works were created by Mani and the early Manichaean community within the bounds of the Sasanian empire during the years of his public mission (c. 240–277 ce) or the first generations afterwards; translated into Coptic during the fourth century at the time of the religion's greatest success in Egypt; and that these particular exemplars were deposited during the period of increased persecution in the Roman Empire that followed the accession of Theodosius (i.e. late fourth century through the early fifth). Any attempt to counter this summary would require radical revisions to accepted views about the history of Manichaeism or the development of Coptic literary production (e.g. the codices are written in a specific dialect and contain extensive examples of scribal production and paratextual details). Recent carbon dating of Medinet Madi material has confirmed the long-held view that the most probable production period for the codices is the half century from the 380s to the 430s ce.Footnote ²⁶

Further, it is possible to be more precise regarding the passage at issue here, the story of Mani, Masoukeos and Goundesh at the gaming table in the palace of King Shapur I. The setting is the 250s–260s ce, the period of the apostle's maturity and public mission. Any historical veracity to the events is highly improbable as the account has clear literary and stylistic patterning, and the obvious motivations to what must be classified as a legendary and hagiographic tale. The terminus ante quem for the production of the codex is c. 420 ce, prior to which time has to be given for the evident stages of development: the working-up of a cycle of stories regarding Mani and the sages with the incorporation of folklore elements; the attaching of this cycle to the developing Kephalaia genre to which they are adapted in format and presentation; the circulation of this material among the Manichaeans of Sasanian Iran and their transport to Egypt; translation into Lycopolitan Coptic and inclusion within a corpus or “library” of works belonging to the community in the Nile valley. With these points in mind, and noting that the inclusion of Kardel son of Artaban and other verifiable elements indicate that the legendary features of the story have not entirely overtaken the historical setting, the proposed date for this material is the first half of the fourth century. Mani died in the 270s and some decades must be allowed for the development of the legendary and folklore aspects of the story such as the setting in the palace of King Shapur, the contests and challenges between the various sages, and so on. At the same time there is a substantial redaction and translation history evident that makes it difficult to suppose that this material originated much later than 350 ce in order to be incorporated into the material remains that have been recovered. Thus the proposed dating is c. 300–350 ce, which necessarily implies that the literary motifs at play were already part of Sasanian culture by that date; and that is the crucial discovery with which to conclude.